How did I find Ayn? A man of business of course. He whispered in my year ears ago to find Atlas Shrugged and to read it and I did. I was lost in it. It's an epic novel, one of those books you read and read and wish you could read forever. I was fascinated by the characters, a strong woman, supported emotionally and intellectually by men who would want women to be their equal. Rand, an ex pat from Russia, the leader of the Objectivism movement here the the states, writes dialog flawlessly and creates a world that is of her own in a way no other woman writer had created before or even since. She writes like a man with the heart of a woman.
If you are a Christian, this writer will slap you in the face. She didn't believe in God when used in the term of charity. She didn't believe that we were put here to serve others that the socialism of that point of view was a way of controlling people. She believed that we weren't born to be a "sacrificial animal" that we better served a higher power by achieving our own happiness and taking care of ourselves. She believed that the self esteem we have for ourselves to put ourselves first and that loving someone unconditionally is truly loving nobody at all.
If Atlas Shrugged seems an overwhelming summer reading undertaking, The Fountainhead is wonderful. It's easy to be lost in the characters here. I have always taken Rand that she isn't cold-hearted but more that she is selective about who to love, who to let close, to love with a discrimination to allow our own lives to flourish. She started a cult under this philosophy and was in herself a social movement of the late 50's and early 60's. I read each of her books and if you read between the lines you can an overwhelming spirit of giving of herself. Nobody writes a book like Atlas Shrugged and not give of yourself to hope to free people from the binds that our religious backgrounds give us. When did we develop a guilt because we do well that we are successful?
I found the interview below on facebook and found it fascinating so I am sharing it here in three parts:
The political conversation here is fascinating to me. If you listen to her carefully she is what I think Republicans hope to be before they get caught up in pandering to the religious right. I Love love love when she talks about the selfish love she shows her husband, that she loves him selfishly. How lovely that thought is to me, to love someone because they bring you joy, because you love their spirit being close to your spirit, savoring them. It reminds me of a poem I read by Edna St. Vincent Milay:
OH, THINK not I am faithful to a vow!
Faithless am I save to love's self alone.
Were you not lovely I would leave you now:
After the feet of beauty fly my own.
Were you not still my hunger's rarest food,
And water ever to my wildest thirst,
I would desert you–think not but I would!–
And seek another as I sought you first.
But you are mobile as the veering air,
And all your charms more changeful than the tide,
Wherefore to be inconstant is no care:
I have but to continue at your side.
So wanton, light and false, my love, are you,
I am most faithless when I most am true.
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Ayn with Donahue on Israel:
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A speech from The Fountainhead that I love:
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Rand on Love:
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I like this too:
Ok, I've been caught up in this and could think about it for days, but I have a day to pursue, things to do. I found this finally and it's well written and although I've not seen the movie advertised here, I'll look for it:
http://hustlebear.com/2011/02/28/im-so-relieved-the-atlas-shrugged-movie-was-fantastic/
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