"Atlas Shrugged” is moronic beyond belief, though it just narrowly edges out “The Fountainhead.” Rand is a fascist and a creep, either of which could be forgiven. But she also cannot write.And so are her fans.
"Atlas Shrugged” is moronic beyond belief, though it just narrowly edges out “The Fountainhead.” Rand is a fascist and a creep, either of which could be forgiven. But she also cannot write.And so are her fans.
4 comments:
Well, that's a kind of yin-yang balance to the culture. Rand was someone who couldn't write, writing for an audience that not only couldn't read, but also seemingly applauded the fact that she couldn't write.
Gingrich's forays into the world of letters are quite another matter....
Actually, I always thought The Fountainhead was tolerably mediocre and moderately readable. She did a decent (though not terribly original) job of establishing the whole Howard Roark vs. the establishment dynamic. The characterizations and plot were middling "A movie" or solidly "B movie" grade, which was basically where she spent her profession.
I could *never* concede any larger philosophical or ideological merit to the thing.
Atlas Shrugged was a wretched attempt to expand a political pamphlet into a blunt-force manifesto for all those who didn't quite "get it" the first time. Of course, by trying to create a bigger-louder-stronger version, all she did was make the whole mess astonishingly worse.
And don't even get me started on the deluded followers who use it as a pretense for a belief system.
I was required to read Anthem. I never made it through either of her mangum dopuses.
Roger, I had to read Atlas Shrugged in an honors English class as a junior in high school, in the early `60s. Said class was taught by one of those wild-eyed libertarians one finds in the far West, and my general disgust with the book earned me a "D" with a special oak leaf cluster for spite. The guy simply refused to acknowledge that the book was a towering pile of excrement. He looooved Ayn Rand.
I got a "D," but I survived and he didn't. Even in the Wild West, you can't assault and batter students and expect to keep your job....
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