Ayn Rand Box Set: ATLAS SHRUGGED and THE FOUNTAINHEAD Paperback – October 6, 2009

Read this years ago then lost my copies in a move. Glad to have found and will re-read again. So much she saw fits today.

Ayn Rand was a brilliant visionary. Students today should be required to read her books. It would open their eyes to the flaws of socialism.

Havnt read them yet; Author is well acclaimed. we will see.

Great books

The recent financial crisis and government action-heavy response have resulted in a resurgence of interest in Ayn Rand. Given its focus on the economy, Atlas Shrugged has understandably received most of the attention. However, Rand's novel on art, The Fountainhead, remains relevant today as well.Before delving into the substance of the books, a few observations on this specific boxed set are in order. Both books are extremely thick, and, as mentioned in other reviews, the typeface is very small, although I still found it perfectly readable. The construction of the box and the nature of paperback books make returning the books to their home a rather Herculean task. Convinced that this particular annoyance should not be confined to magazines, Randians have included a postcard in each book. I broke the spine of one in my attempts to remove the postcard completely. That being said, the boxed set looks good on a book shelf (and that is what boxed sets are really all about) and the price per word is excellent.The Fountainhead follows two architects, Howard Roark and Peter Keating, over the course of their early careers (the novel spans approximately two decades). Dominique Francon serves as the love interest and stand-in for the author. Roark, Keating, Gail Wynand, and Ellsworth Toohey (the other two main male characters) are each intended to represent an archetype. Roark is the man who is, Keating is the man who could not be and did not know it, Wynand is the man who could have been and did not know it, and Toohey is the man who could not be and knew it.Atlas Shrugged follows its protagonist, railroad executive Dagny Taggart, and other industrialists and entrepreneurs as they react to and struggle for success in business notwithstanding a government exerting more and more control over the economy and industry. The politicians do not do it alone; they are heavily assisted by rent-seeking crony capitalists and their lobbyists. This famously culminates in the entrepreneurs going on "strike." Where Rand uses archetypes in The Fountainhead to explore her ideas about art and architecture, in Atlas Shrugged she uses science fiction tropes to explore her ideas about business and economics.Rand's work shines when it stays character-driven and suffers when event-driven. The courtroom scenes in The Fountainhead and the rescue attempt at the end of Atlas Shrugged are almost ludicrously bad. On the hand, the building of the John Galt Line and the tunnel disaster in Atlas Shrugged are masterful. Her prose is quite beautiful, if a bit on the ornate side. While her idealized protagonists (Roark, Galt) tend to be rather flat and dull, her less-than-perfect protagonists (Wynand, Reardan) are much more interesting, and her antagonists can be downright terrifying (Toohey, most of the crony capitalists, lobbyists, and politicians from Atlas Shrugged). For a female writer, Rand's female characters are curiously unsympathetic (Francon may be the most unsympathetic protagonist I have ever encountered).Both are books about ideas, and I appreciate that. They are certainly preferable to reading actual philosophy tracts. The philosophy is not always well interwoven into the story, however, most famously in Galt's seventy page monologue near the end of Atlas Shrugged.

Who is John Galt? Who idealizes, manifests human superiority in an iconic figure? What are the boundaries of human ventures? Why do we wake up and go out into the large world around us? What and where are purpose, success, and productivity? Ayn Rand hardly needs my introductory lauding of her defining works but here goes nothing.Rated second most influential book only to the bible, considered the narrated codex of principals for the eccentric order of the Objectivists, the intellectual work which challenged commitment, passion, and ability, taking over a decade to formulate into layman's terms with ink on paper; Ayn Rand masters the art of conveying hours of propaganda in an exciting and dramatic novel. Both "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead" consolidate goose bump invoking ideals of the potential Homo sapien. She sets a bar of striving forward with ardent commitment in any system and in any field under any circumstances. Her system of values exist void of any relation to economy or capitol although that is the sphere she focuses on. These are not mere novels, they are testimony to an idealized trajectory of passion, production, and purpose.The book size was comfortable in my palm through the long hours of reading, and the surrounding box kept everything compact. As with everything, over time the cardboard will lose its strength but even semi diligent care will see this set lasting a long time.

Never read this author until now-that's my fault. I am 2/3 thru The Fountainhead, I wish it was a lot longer, I don't want it to end. What an incredible writer she was. I have heard that Atlas Shrugged is even better, will get to that shortly. This novel reads like a John Steinbeck story, full of interesting characters and beleivable plots. I don't think there are many contemporary writers in her league, they all seem to be more concerned about showing their political bias and their virtue signaling.

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