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Loading... Atlas Shrugged (1957)by Ayn Rand
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» 43 more Favorite Long Books (74) 1950s (75) 20th Century Literature (480) Female Author (662) Female Protagonist (469) Books Read in 2020 (3,813) Banned Books Week 2014 (164) Política - Clásicos (88) Read These Too (150) Mad Men Reading List (16) Nifty Fifties (51) Shelf 101 (27) SHOULD Read Books! (189) Books on my Kindle (123) Very Very Bad (20) Awful Books (5) 2017 Goal (18) Best Dystopias (225) Great American Novels (127) Unread books (641) Favourite Books (1,732) No current Talk conversations about this book. This, along with The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand), is the greatest text ever written. The reason the book is so great is because it understands what is evil, and has the only proper presentations of heroic people in writing. The characters of Dagny and Hank (along with others that I will not spoil) are heroes in the truest sense of the word. ( ![]() A philosophical treatise in the form of a novel. I enjoyed the story immensely - it's a reverse Zorro story, if that makes sense, and the Dread Pirate Roberts makes an appearance - but admit that after the fourth or fifth 20-page sermon, I skimmed the rest of them. I dare say I agree with a good portion of Rand's philosophy, but I found myself saying, "Alright already! Let's get back to the story, lady..." quite a few times. Overall, it's an enjoyable book and one I'd recommend, especially if you don't mind skimming long monologues every now and then. A staggering portrait of emptiness. If only someone had remembered to tell the author. Atlas Shrugged is breathtaking empty. Devoid of morality, depleted of literary skill, deprived of sensible plot, deserted of dialogue. Philosophy textbooks disguised as novels are rarely appealing, but especially not when the underlying philosophy is so absurd. Like much throat-slitting libertarianism (which Rand chose to call "objectivism"), the views make minimal sense in regard to their actions, but make no sense whatsoever in regard to the consequences of those actions. Take a few logical steps down the line and see what kind of world you'll end up in if you follow these instructions. (If you're reading this on the cusp of the 2020s, you won't have to do too much guessing; Rand's principles underwrite some of our most prominent world politicians and thinkers.) Run. Take your children and your pets, grab that wad of cash from under grandma's mattress, and head for the hills. A world awaits you there of kindness and compassion, and - for that matter - genuine literature. Maybe you'll enjoy [a:Lawrence Durrell|8166|Lawrence Durrell|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1463722118p2/8166.jpg] or [a:Sally Rooney|15860970|Sally Rooney|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1534007127p2/15860970.jpg]? Perhaps you're a [a:Toni Morrison|3534|Toni Morrison|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1494211316p2/3534.jpg] type, a [a:Kazuo Ishiguro|4280|Kazuo Ishiguro|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1424906625p2/4280.jpg] acolyte, mad for [a:John Barth|8113|John Barth|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1222685060p2/8113.jpg] or eager for [a:George Eliot|173|George Eliot|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1596202587p2/173.jpg]. Whatever you choose, it's got to be better than this. As Robinson Jeffers famously said, "when the cities lie at the monster's feet, there are left the mountains". All those words and it still falls short of any poignancy. There are certainly enjoyable parts of the story although I fell the soliloquies are too long winded and tend to repeat themselves. This is by no means a must-read book although if you ever had even a slight desire to read it you should probably make an attempt.
"Despite laborious monologues, the reader will stay with this strange world, borne along by its story and eloquent flow of ideas." "to warn contemporary America against abandoning its factories, neglecting technological progress and abolishing the profit motive seems a little like admonishing water against running uphill." "inspired" and "monumental" but "(t)o the Christian, everyone is redeemable. But Ayn Rand’s ethical hardness may repel those who most need her message: that charity should be voluntary…. She should not have tried to rewrite the Sermon on the Mount." Atlas Shrugged represents a watershed in the history of world literature. Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article... "We struggle to be just. For we cannot help feeling at least a sympathetic pain before the sheer labor, discipline, and patient craftsmanship that went to making this mountain of words. But the words keep shouting us down. In the end that tone dominates. But it should be its own antidote, warning us that anything it shouts is best taken with the usual reservations with which we might sip a patent medicine. Some may like the flavor. In any case, the brew is probably without lasting ill effects. But it is not a cure for anything. Nor would we, ordinarily, place much confidence in the diagnosis of a doctor who supposes that the Hippocratic Oath is a kind of curse." "remarkably silly" and "can be called a novel only by devaluing the term" ... "From almost any page of Atlas Shrugged, a voice can be heard, from painful necessity, commanding: 'To the gas chambers — go!'" Is contained inContainsIs abridged inInspiredHas as a reference guide/companionHas as a commentary on the textHas as a student's study guideHas as a teacher's guide
This is the story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world, and did. Is he a destroyer or a liberator? Why does he have to fight his battle not against his enemys but against those who need him most? Why does he fight his hardest battle against the woman he loves? You will learn the answers to these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events that play havoc with the lives of the amazing men and women in this remarkable book. Tremendous in scope, breathtaking in its suspense, "Atlas shrugged" is Ayn Rand's magnum opus, which launched an ideology and a movement. With the publication of this work in 1957, Rand gained an instant following and became a phenomenon. "Atlas shrugged" emerged as a premier moral apologia for Capitalism, a defense that had an electrifying effect on millions of readers (and now listeners) who have never heard Capitalism defended in other than technical terms. No library descriptions found. |
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![]() GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.52Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1900-1944LC ClassificationRatingAverage:![]()
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