The Fountainhead & Atlas Shrugged

[TJ in Oregon]

I just finished reading Atlas shrugged this afternoon and it was well... different.

I think Rand has a few legitament points, mainly about the "looters" in the book but overall it was lacking in many ways. For one, there are only two characters in the book that are just copied over and over again with different names: the industrialist and the looter, no one else.

She seems to be operating under some kind of strange delusion that emotion is completely useless in all situations. Even her best musician writes with no emotion. Huh? How can the world's best musician operate that way. It's totally unbelieveable but to make an exception would ruin her thesis. It's sort of irritating that all her "good" characters are also psychopaths. It's like her idea of a utopia can only be achieved when we suck the world dry of all personal relationships. Who'd want to live in such a world as that even if the trains do come on time? Her ideas of how science is conducted are rather absurd as well.

I also virulently dissagree with her views of religion and sex (which probably goes without saying). She seems to be simultaneously arguing that morals are absolute and that morality doesn't exist.