Anyone like any of her books? What do you recommend for a first time reader-- Atlas Shrugged maybe?

These books seem daunting to me...I have tried to read them but didn't get engaged but I am going to try again, been on my reading list for quite a long time..my r.l. is so long though. Just wondered what to buy to have on my shelf if the mood strikes me.

i believe she has been throughly discussed in some past threads. Have a search round, the reactions were mainly negative. I'vee not read anything by her yet.

I'll do a search. I went to college with a guy who totally loved her and all of her work...but I just can't get engaged in whatever I have tried to start.

she's really impersonal, and what she wrote motivates a lot of today's capitalists and republicans...

on the flip, the film from 1998 with Helen Mirren

"The Passion Of Ayn Rand"

excellent, first rate. an artshouse sort of film, it romanticizes Rand and tells the story. Mirren is a great actress. also Eric Stolz. It might be a better intro. Yeah i know this is an old thread. Rand has been dead and in a hole in the ground since the eighties. She and what she said is still UTTERLY relevant, especially her logical flaws inconsistencies and contradictions...

i love her

read atlas shrugged

I've read Atlas Shrugged and agree with the people who claim she's a hack writer who uses cheap melodrama to illustrate her philosophies. I don't think people read her books for the quality of the writing.

And someone told me if you read her earlier, shorter works you don't have to bother with the fucking telephone books like Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. She says everything she has to say in far fewer pages.

here's the other thread.

http://kittyradio.com/soapbox/writte...-ayn-rand.html

I think she's a waste of your time, especially if you aren't finding you're interested in her anyway. don't force yourself to read something just because it's attracted lots of attention.

The neo-con snatch pack are really into Rand, but ignore the part where she thinks God is bullshit.

^ This is true. She's impersonal and cruel because she is the idol of people who are just fucking cruel.

shes a BEAST

this guy i knew, tom carter (from charlambidies? anyways it was a cool band) said that any time he found out that someone liked ayn rand he had to entirely reevaluate the way he viewed that person. i totally agree.

__________________
the cave mouth shines
by pure force of will
i look down on the world
from the top of this lonesome hill
and you can run, and run some more
from here all the way to singapore
but i will carry you home in my teeth
-mountain goats

I think shes an awesome woman. Read her biographical story, its hard not to admire her courage and incredulity.

She is hated in America because she was pro-American/Capitalism during the cold war (I know, semi weird), and pro-objectivism when it was only cool to like idiots like Derrida.

She basically offends everybody who doesnt think science is the superior way of knowing and isnt pro-capitalism. Because she is cunty and snobby in dismissing these people.

I think she upsets people too because she was an artist in an era when hippie/indie types 'individuate' by opposing themselves against the science/capitalism//pragmatism 'truth regime'. Hippie /indie types tend to think they have a monogamy on creative thought. Its kind of like how right-wing homophobes get disconcerted when gays start calling themselves 'fagz' or whatever.

Her philosophy is an elaborate and systematic defence of objective thought as the only valid way of thinking. She makes many technical errors (for example, totally misunderstanding Kant), for which critics pounce.

But to me, the weight of the reaction against her for the errors reveals more about the zealot-psyche of the Rand-haters than is does Rand.

ANTHEM

one of my favorite books of all time! i recommend reading Anthem.

I don't really care about her politics, I just think her books are a fucking snoozefest.

even if i had happened to like ayn rand, my years on this site has forever ruined her for me. upon the very mention of her name, my immediate reflex is to yell AYN RAND IS A FUCKING NUTCASE! INSANE! BAD! LIKE A CRAB!

it doesn't even require thinking. it's like one of those put-your-hand-on-a-hotplate reactions.

luckily, from what i've read about her writings and philosophy, it is pretty much correct. utter bullshit. i know i really ought to actually read some of it, not just about it, but certain kinds of thinking just make me physically ill. reading her opinions makes me think of all the people who think like that, and i get so angry i just have to stop and put it away. i can handle a lot, but not blatant lack of empathy and ability to see how the world actually works around you. it's all so wrong, and in so many ways, i just don't even know where to start. it's crap. BULLSHIT.

Also its not suprising that capitalists love her. Capitalism is impersonal. Its a game. A zero sum game where someone wins because someone else loses. That certainly cant sit well with anyone with a left wing/socialist bent. Capitalists believe the greatest good is getting the highest reward for the least risk. The great hypocrisy of humankind is that most of them act as if they are so above her impersonal, objectivist stance in their own dealings with humankind. Id say choosing your friends, lovers, schools, and careers on a set of preordained qualities is about as "impersonal" as it can get.