So, I finally finished Atlas Shrugged. Phew.
What to say? Well, it’s an interesting novel, though waaaaaaaay too long. For instance, I basically skipped the climactic speech towards the very end – 20 or so pages at least – since if you’ve actually read and understood the previous 950 pages, the speech is pretty much redundant. As are the majority of the longer soliloquies earlier in the book. Someone ought to give Rand a lesson in «show, don’t tell». Are all «philosophers» this wordy? Actually, I know the answer to that, and it’s «Many, but no, not all».
There’s much to say in favour of Rands philiosophy. Admittedly there’s much to say against it, too. I suspect it’s mostly been said already, so I won’t…
One thing I will say is that a major stumbling block for me – or rather, for Rand’s attempt at converting me – is the feeling one gets that though she seems to find few enough men worthy of any attention, she finds even fewer women. Dagny Taggart is the only woman who really makes herself felt in the novel. With the exception of two peripheral characters (one of which comes to grief before she has a chance of proper «redemption»), all the other «worthy» persons are men. And naturally quite a few of these «worthy» men are in love with Dagny. Fair enough, but as the writer is a woman herself and the novel an acknowledged explanation of a personal philosophy one can’t help feel that Dagny is meant to be at least partly a self-portrait and the hopeless devotion of all these super-humans leaves one with an unpleasant taste in one’s mouth. It’s all a bit too self-applauding (which is a common problem with missionaries, of course).
Beneath all the waffle (and there is a lot of waffle – if you’re no good at skimming, stay away from this book (I’m told you can read The Fountainhead instead…)) Atlas Shrugged is a very engaging story. The plot is fundamentally good – though longwinded – and Rand builds a pretty convincing argument. At least it’s convincing within the confines of the novel, once you step outside again it’s fairly easy to point to flaws. So easy, in fact, that I’m not sure I can be bothered here and now. Come have a cup of tea (or whatever) and discuss it in person if you’re interested 😉