...actually that's a lie. I tried to read it 3 times. And I mean, I really, really tried. But I found it unreadable. You can find better quality writing in the romance and western sections at your average grocery store.

I will admit that the writings of Yaron Brook at the Ayn Rand Institute is far superior, and he presents her views better then Rand ever could, in my estimation.

If it's  just readers voting, the the  selections can be manipulated.  But the  other books on the list are great, so it may be that a lot of people really like Rand.  As I said in response to WW's post, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is incredibly popular but I hated it.  Go figya.

-- Modified on 4/19/2011 5:57:24 PM

The fact that both are popular says nothing either for or against either of them. After all, both Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan were also both popular. Yes?

I've never gotten through anything L. Ron Hubbard has written; though in general I'm a fan of sci fi and fantasy. In that genre I like writers like Peter Hamilton (the Neutronium Alchemist series), Robert Jordan and Terry Goodkind among others. But I could never stand Hubbard for some reason. Maybe he's great and I'll just never know.

Not surprisingly given my handle, I have read nearly everything Rand ever wrote, both fiction and her more prolific (and usually more readable) non-fiction. My favorite fictional novels of hers are Anthem and We the Living. Both are shorter and better written than either The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged, and I think they are well worth reading.

I believe she was struggling with character development in The Fountainhead. She had difficulty, imho, making Howard and Dominique three dimensional for readers who didn't "get it." Nevertheless, it is still a very worthwhile book.

Atlas Shrugged, on the other hand, I believe is really an amazingly nuanced and multi-layered work that can be read at many different levels. In this book she first brings to fruition in application her ideas of what she termed psycho-epistemology.

Are her ideas original? No -- not at all. She borrowed strongly from Nietzsche (without crediting him) along with Aristotle and Aquinas (both of whom she credits) and then later throws in a large dose of Fromm (see, for example, Fromm's "Man for Himself" to find phrases she lifted en toto).

Though her earlier work and short stories are unambiguously tied to Nietzsche and GB Shaw; and though her later work reflects the influence of Fromm who, philosophically, would be her nemesis; I believe she did a very excellent job in three realms.

1. Making clear the importance of philosophy. See, for example, her book "Philosophy: Who Needs it?"
2. Making a creditable attempt at a value system that holds rational human life as its standard of value. (See her article "The Objectivist Ethics"
3. Making a link between philosophy/values and behavior that is worthwhile. (See her numerous articles on psycho-epistemology and her definitions of such concepts as "hatred of the good.")

Nothing produced by a being with limited knowledge, preconceived ideas that may be incorrect (such as her belief in radical nurturance with humans having NO innate qualities other than reason), and limited time will ever be flawless; and Rand's work is certainly subject to fair critique.

Nevertheless, anyone who has read her non-fiction can report that she damned sure gave it a college try -- which is more than her critics have ever done.

I am glad that Atlas Shrugged is popular. However, it is clearly not well understood. If it were, things would not be as they are.

As follow-ups, allow me to recommend Unintended Consequences and Starving the Monkeys.