Ayn Rand's work as a novelist was first introduced to this writer by a professor of English in a three-hour undergraduate course in the American Novel (1966). The instructor's stated reason for the inclusion of a representative work by Rand was to provide, for comparative perspective, a poorly organized literary work as an example of bad writing and poor character development. It was observed that the figures in the novel who represented views, ideology, or government programs with which Rand disagreed ideologically were invariably straw men. The one-dimensional quality of the characters presented in the course of the development of any novel written by Rand is difficult to deny. Random House was a primary publisher of Rand's novels, but when she presented a 'so-called' philosophical work for that house to consider for publication it was absolutely turned down by Mr. Bennett A. Cerf, who provides details in his Autobiography. In the course of thirty years of observing Rand-related phenomena I have seen nothing that would contradict Mr. Cerf's judgment that Rand's nonfictional material was unfit for an established house to publish.
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