COLLOQUY

THE QUESTION

RESPONSES

BACKGROUND

(have never read her):

"Anthem" -- A prose poem, short. An introduction to her views on freedom and the rights of man. Simply and beautifully written. Does not go into the details of her philosophy.

(want a deeper view or another novel):

Atlas Shrugged -- Her magnum opus. Partly a powerful romantic novel and partly a work of philosophy. The most influential novel of ideas of the twentieth century. Radical and challenging.

(the details of her political and ethical philosophy):

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal -- it shows how her system would actually work in practice and, as an appendix, has essays from her ethics book (The Virtue of Selfishness) which make her moral foundation and arguments clearer.

.....

The above books are the briefest possible intro to Ayn Rand -- if you haven't read Atlas and at least the essays "What is Capitalism" and "The Objectivist Ethics" from the book Capitalism, it's not possible to figure her out.

You will confuse her with a conservative or a libertarian or a classical liberal. Or you will make the mistake of thinking she is purely political thinker. She's more complex than that--Atlas is only superficially about politics.

To go further, into her epistemology and metaphysics, Leonard Peikoff's Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand is the only comprehensive work on her whole system by a philosopher who studied under her.

Web sites: www.objectivistcenter.org and aynrand.org -- these are organizations that conduct lectures, have conferences, and publish on her philosophy and support it. The former is more liberal, working with libertarians and other allies who are not "Objectivists". The latter, more orthodox, feels that to work with such groups is to compromise her philosophy. www.capitalism.net is a useful site by an economist and a psychologist who knew her and apply Rand's philosophy to those topics. They have well-written books and essays to offer.

-- Philip Coates, B.A., Brown; M.S., Michigan (posted 9/20, 10:12 a.m., E.D.T.)

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