Its something kids believe maybe until theyre 20 or so, and hopefully if they’ve actually seen the world and have empathy realize they are fairy tales, not something to strive for.
Maybe her other books are better, but Atlas Shrugged was such a slog for me. I can’t even reccomend it as a curiousity.
Ayn made even the sex scenes mechanical and cold, which would have been a great artistic choice to show how dead inside the MCs all were, but she was going for “this makes Dagny strong and empowered!” It wasn’t intentional at all.
Then there’s the section in the middle where they fuck off to “galt-land” and everything the was building up in the real world just kind of stops mattering, until they decide to leave. Another thing that would have been great if intentional, if there were consequences for running away from things, but they just come back like nothing happened.
Except for the biggest problem of all in the book: The fucking radio broadcast chapter. It’s 3/4 of the way into the book. If you don’t understand the themes by that point then you’re blind. But she devotes an entire fucking chapter to having John “perfect representation of the themes in human form” Galt blather on for (iirc) over 20 pages reiterating the themes explicitly.
Some jackass takes over all radio broadcasts, spends hours rambling about the supremacy of people who make things happen… and nothing fucking happens as far as I can recall.
It’s like 50 pages long, which yeah, is way too long.
But what he’s actually doing is calling for a general strike. He’s explaining that if every productive person just stops contributing to society for a few years, then the parasitic oligarchy will die out, because they’re not capable of keeping things running themselves.
It doesn’t resolve the overt conflict, but it’s suggested that his plan is in motion by the end.
![[NoahBuckley] Start with you](https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/pictrs/image/42c96481-98d6-4a84-b48c-c11781f43a98.webp){kind=link}
Its something kids believe maybe until theyre 20 or so, and hopefully if they’ve actually seen the world and have empathy realize they are fairy tales, not something to strive for.
I still enjoyed reading her books though.
Maybe her other books are better, but Atlas Shrugged was such a slog for me. I can’t even reccomend it as a curiousity.
Ayn made even the sex scenes mechanical and cold, which would have been a great artistic choice to show how dead inside the MCs all were, but she was going for “this makes Dagny strong and empowered!” It wasn’t intentional at all.
Then there’s the section in the middle where they fuck off to “galt-land” and everything the was building up in the real world just kind of stops mattering, until they decide to leave. Another thing that would have been great if intentional, if there were consequences for running away from things, but they just come back like nothing happened.
Except for the biggest problem of all in the book: The fucking radio broadcast chapter. It’s 3/4 of the way into the book. If you don’t understand the themes by that point then you’re blind. But she devotes an entire fucking chapter to having John “perfect representation of the themes in human form” Galt blather on for (iirc) over 20 pages reiterating the themes explicitly.
Some jackass takes over all radio broadcasts, spends hours rambling about the supremacy of people who make things happen… and nothing fucking happens as far as I can recall.
It’s like 50 pages long, which yeah, is way too long.
But what he’s actually doing is calling for a general strike. He’s explaining that if every productive person just stops contributing to society for a few years, then the parasitic oligarchy will die out, because they’re not capable of keeping things running themselves.
It doesn’t resolve the overt conflict, but it’s suggested that his plan is in motion by the end.