Are you disagreeing with me? I’ve actually read that book, and yours is not an accurate description.
I think they changed it to something that was not objectivist? Anyway, his goals certainly weren’t just about money.
The contract Roark got for designing the project stated that no one would change his design once it was approved, and that it would be built according to the plan. The owners (it was a public housing project) reneged on the contract after the fact and brought in some of their own hack architects who imposed their own “vision” on the project.
While it could be argued that blowing the thing up was a little excessive, he certainly was completely in the right, according to the contract signed by both parties, to at least sue them for a very large amount of money.
Rand’s writings are certainly some of the most difficult and controversial words ever put to paper. I try to remember she suffered greatly at the hands of the real Communist bastards. Take her words and apply them to a population under the heel of a Dictator, or a commie/socialist government, and it makes a great deal more sense.
Sometimes I take her writings, and change them to the exact opposite, to see how it sounds from the other sound. I find that in such a case, I prefer her vision of freedom much more than the reverse.
Roark had no contract with the owners of the building. His contract was with Keating, and Roark had no right to sue them for anything, much less commit arson.
Oh, yeah, you’re right. It’s been many, many years since I read The Fountainhead. Mea culpa. I’m not sure what I was thinking, but I was way off the mark with what I said.
based on your previous post, no, I guess I’m agreeing with you. If it’s NOT an accurate description (thios non-Randian is dubious of that claim), than what IS an accurate description. IOW-convince me that Rand’s attitude isn’t,“All mine, all mine and NO you can’t have ANYTHING I have, and HOW DARE you think that I’m not part of a wider world, and have no responsibility to the betterment/upkeep my society”
That’s not what you said before. You said it was all about money, for an objectivist. But it isn’t. For instance, in The Fountainhead, the hero cares a lot about aesthetics of the buildings he designs, much more than personal wealth. But you are right that objectivist people have no responsibility about the betterment of society. Also, the focus is not that people can’t have anything of yours, the focus is that you shouldn’t be forced to give away anything. But if you feel like giving something away, that is not against the spirit.
I’m curious. In what way do you believe they are difficult?
I disagree. It doesn’t depend on the person. It depends on the system that exists before the person comes along. The primary problem with the concept of not giving what is yours is that it appears to be too easy to overestimate how much of “yours” you got completely independently of everyone else. You cannot sell a million computers without a vast infrastructure that provides not only you with access to the resources to build them, advertise them, move them, etc., but which also provides the million purchasers with the means to need them, learn about them, buy them, and so on and so forth. I am in no way discounting the individual expertise and gumption and so on that one brings to the table in order to help make that happen, but it takes a vast system of people to allow that to happen, and not just a special band of a few magical people who never make any false moves.
Come on. There are no Ayn Rand heroes! Again, you first acknowledge that such people are pure fantasy, and then you suggest they might exist in reality. There is no superman. There is no Iron Man. There is no simplistic, two-dimensional, cartoonishly wonderful John Galt. There is no perpetual energy machine. There is no realistic dichotomy of looters versus purely virtuous genius producers. This is why your suggestion of Iron Man as exemplifying Objectivism was quite apt.
That you, or anyone else, feels the need to say that, it perhaps illustrates part of “the difficulty” I mentioned. While Iron Man comics and Superman comics abound, (as well as movies now), and have been around for longer than Rand, nobody feels the need to point out to teenagers that they are fictions.
Atlas Shrugged on the other hand, it has, even now, some sort of power that envelops the young mind, and even with it’s extreme length, and archaic prose, people still read the book.
And it’s not an easy book to read. It’s difficult. It’s long for one thing. With lots of words.
I was just reading a scathing criticism elsewhere of The Fountainhead, before I read the previous few comments. Fascinating arc there/here. In fact, I can feel the whole philosophical debate sucking me in at the moment, something I’ve managed to avoid for many years.
There’s something not right about that opening salvo. But to explain it, delve into it, will require great effort.
I don’t follow how that explains any difficulty. It’s really not difficult to observe that Rand’s characterizations are extremely shallow and unrealistic to the point of being pure fantasy. In that sense, it’s not surprising to hear that their film depiction suffers similarly. Poorly written does not equal “difficult” writing (but see my concluding comment).
How is the prose archaic? And I wouldn’t be the first to make an unkind comparison between Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. Those qualities don’t typically result in Tolkein’s writings being described as difficult.
Aha! Here we get to the point of agreement. I agree that the difficulty in slogging through Atlas Shrugged is the sheer volume of words. The difficulty is that those words are tediously repeating the same point endlessly, with very little variation. Tedious writing is in fact difficult to bear. It should not be confused with complex writing. Dos Passos’ writings are sometimes described as difficult, but typically when saying so, one means that the degree to which you have to think about what is written makes it challenging.
Rand’s writings aren’t difficult in that they make you think. They’re difficult in that the sheer repetition of superficial concepts makes your mind wander, makes you become aware of physical and mental fatigue, and makes you wonder why you continue. And then you finally reach John Galt’s speech!
It’s also boring as shit.
It’s not difficult in terms of basic langage or concepts, though, as can be attested by it’s seeminly eternal appeal to high school sophomores.
Hmm … actually, having read the book several times, I would have to say it is the opposite of what you are saying. The first chapter is example enough.
http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_ayn_rand_books_atlas_shrugged
With deft economy she has already hooked the reader in with several powerful memes. Introducing both the Galt question, latent sexuality, a powerful woman in charge, and all that with out any of the science fiction that appears later. But none of that even comes close to the mysterious 5th symphony question, which is the very first mystery introduced.
But, books are like music or movies.
De gustibus non est disputandum
How am I being inconsistent? Are you arguing that goods aren’t equivalent to $? Are you also arguing that people don’t have neighbors, fellow citizens, and a vested interest in their well-being? If so, I’m DAMN glad I don’t live in that world, and hope I never do.
Well, I do believe that you are the first person I’ve ever encountered who described the writing in Atlas Shrugged using the word “economy.” At least, without corresponding negation.
You also seem to be using the word “memes” in an unusual way, but I suppose that’s neither here nor there.
As you suggest, there’s no accounting for taste, and if you regard Rand as economical in her writing, there’s just a chasm between our opinions that we shall not be able to bridge.
In other news, Atlas Shrugged Part I finished its second weekend at #18 in total box office receipts. Over the weekend, it accumulated just under $0.9M (for a total of $3.1M) meaning an average of $1.9K per theatre (465 theatres total). (source: www.rottentomatoes.com)
A low-budget flop, in other words. Those are poor returns, even considering the limited release in theaters.
It has a 6% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but somehow still an 85% audience approval.
I don’t really feel like continuing this discussion, since it is too confusing for me, and I don’t understand what it is you disagree with me about.
My original point was that the hero cared about other things than profit optimization, such as the aesthetics of his work, and thus it was not against objectivism to lose money on a project. That you expressed disagreement with, but now I don’t know of what opinion you are.
We’ll know the full story when the DVD comes out. Something tells me this is the kind of movie that could do very well domestically on DVD sales, but we’ll see.
One big strike against it is that it will likely have a very small international market, being a rather uniquely American subject and point of view.