Atlas Shrugged

I don't understand how it became so popular, because it was terrible. I was only able to read it for the reason that it is divided into three parts, otherwise I would have thrown it out long ago. What's wrong with that? I will tell.

About the plot. Bad socialists are destroying the country's economy, the heroine is trying to save the business and along the way find out where most entrepreneurs and creative people have gone.

So that you understand this is the plot of the book, which was divided into three parts, where each has 400+ pages. How did it happen? And it's simple, most of the books are monologues and a love triangle. I'm not kidding, she just repeats her ideas, without presenting anything new in them, and they are all based on "Objectivism is good, Capitalism is cool, and the rest is shit on the sole."

There are two ideas that are being preached here. I like the first one: "Love what you do." This is a good idea, but I absolutely don't like the second one, namely the philosophy of objectivism. In short, what it means: "Spit on everyone, think only about your success, the rest is just a hindrance, and that's when you'll be the best." There's nothing wrong with the idea itself, but here's how it's presented. All people who come up with their ideology and philosophy have one distinctive feature, their worlds work only if there are ideal people and work only on paper. That communism sounded good only on paper, that objectivism works only under "superhumans" and convenient circumstances.

There are no characters here, only puppets who speak the author's ideas. And she used a cheap move. All the positive characters are all handsome in a row, they seem to have come out of fashion magazines, and all the negative ones (I repeat all) are ugly and scary, like ugly bastards from Hentai. And at the same time, I also think that the economy in this world is collapsing because of the positive characters, because they just reveled in how great they are, and they did not bother to train their workers. So that you understand, they fixed all the problems themselves, not the workers. Of course, the economy will collapse from such leaders.

The text here is bad. He looks like a man with no experience in writing, trying to be like the thinkers of the 20th century. And if you thought the sex scenes from "50 Shades of Grey" were terrible, you just haven't read this book.

This book is terrible. It was written by a woman who didn't understand economics, who thought she was a philosopher. She claims that without Atlanteans, the world will collapse. So let's see, the creator of the TVs died, but they still exist and they have progressed, Steve Jobs died, and the Apple campaign is still there and making good money, everyone who created the light bulb died, but they still exist. Most of the things created a long time ago are still there, and their creators "Atlanteans" have long died. I wonder why our world hasn't collapsed yet. And the best answer to the idea of this book is the game "Bioshock", which showed what would happen if such a world existed.

P.S Guys, I didn't know that you have such posts published monthly. I just read the book and shared my opinion about it, I didn't know there were hundreds if not thousands of them here. And I am not a communist, not a socialist, not someone to be offended by opposing views that do not correspond to any philosophy or economics. It's just a review of a book that I don't like.

I recently came across a twitter thread (I refuse to say X) where someone went on and on about a how brilliant a book Atlas Shrugged is. As an avid book reader, I'd definitely heard of this book but knew little about it. I would officially like to say eff you to the person who suggested it and eff you to Ayn Rand who I seriously believe is a sociopath.

And it gives me a good deal of satisfaction knowing this person ended up relying on social security. Her writing is not good and she seems like she was a horrible person... I mean, no character in this book shows any emotion - it's disturbing and to me shows a reflection of the writer, I truly think she experienced little emotion or empathy and was a sociopath....

ETA: Maybe it was a blessing reading this, as any politician who quotes her as an inspiration will immediately be met with skepticism by myself... This person is effed up... I don't know what happened to her as a child but I digress...

I'm sorry but I don't think I've ever read a book so freaking absurd. Not a surprise that the book aged like milk cause the hero and heroine (Hank & Dagny) are so freaking great in everything they do, and the rest of the mankind is so dumb and pathetic. The thing is that Hank and Dagny don't even have a journey of growth which led them to their greatness. They are just born extraordinary, superhuman beings.

But unarguably, the worst thing about this book is that there's a chapter called Moratorium on Brains, in which a train which is packed with passengers crashes and they all die, and Rand basically goes into detail about each dead passenger's personal ideology and beliefs and uses their philosophy (which is different from her philosophy of utter selfishness and greed) to justify their death.

Like, that is so f**ked up on so many levels that I don't even know what to say.

I would say, I would have liked Dagny as a character if she had a little bit of empathy. It's good to have ambition and drive and I liked that about Dagny. It's good to be a go-getter but it's not cool to have zero regard and empathy for others.

It's completely possible for one to be ambitious and thoughtful but Ayn Rand failed to understand that.

I've noted this many times before: I've played which I've found amazing and heard it was based on . "Wow", I though, "this AMAZING game is based on a book, must be doubly amazing, I must read it!"

Oh no, and so I have. Atlas Shrugged is a terrible book. It reads like fanfic. Atlas Shrugged is like "50 shades of gray", but for the economy.

It's a long winded love letter to capitalism, with engineers and CEOs being by far the smartest, purest and best beings on our Earth, basically Disney princesses in suits, with doves landing on their lapels and everything.

Being an inventor or a capitalist basically means you're the world champion of philosophy, limbo and sex.

This goes for women too! Well, A woman who's equal to them in every way, except when she gets horny and requires a good tending to, you know, like a silly woman does. But only by her intellectually and entrepreneurial equal, can't have some schmo with no patents to his name caress your snow-white complexion with his rough inventor hands, looking at you with steely blue eyes.

The grand finale is some guy reading out a manifesto on a radio or something to the entire Earth, everybody sits and listens in silence for hours because that's what 80 pages of it felt like.

Why is Atlas Shrugged so revered?

Edit: half of the comments answer it's not revered at all, the other half are calling me an idiot for not understanding its majesty.

It's not a book about economy or capitalism because they don't work even close to what the book describes, the version of capitalism and social dynamics outlined in the book is the "Saturday morning cartoon" version at best.

I read The Fountainhead years ago, as a late teenager. Then, I enjoyed it.

So, I started Atlas Shrugged just recently. I haven't gotten too far into it. I've seen the things about Rand, and what a heroine she is to the conservative crowd. But, this isn't a novel; it's a large piece of unending propaganda. And, it's poorly written. There are a few, proud, strong, misunderstood, individuals, and then there's everybody else, who are all about THE COLLECTIVE - and they hate the few, proud, strong, misunderstood, individuals for daring to be individuals. And, ALL the people who support the collective have something fundamentally wrong about them. They're bad and weak people, one and all.

Regardless of your politics, this is terrible literature. It makes sense that a person coming out of the collective society of the USSR would have it in for collective thinking. But, Rand really has it in for the collective. It's doubtful that I'll get too far with this thing because the message is completely clear in the first 10 pages, and it's damn big book. How many times do I need to re-read the same message, over and over again?

I know Atlas Shrugged is enormously famous book among libertarians who see it as a symbol of resistance to government tyranny. This is surprising because it is a horrendous book containing cardboard characters, over unnecessarily long speeches, absurd plot lines and at least 500 pages more than it needs.

Edit: Guys,I think many of you missed the point. It has nothing to do with who is a libertarian and who’s not.I’m just surprised a book written this badly somehow turned out to be so likeable :D

Let me explain.

I’ve been reading about 50 pages of it a day for a while now, and I gotta day, it’s not all that it’s acclaimed to be.

It’s not that I don’t dislike the ideology, per say. I mean, I don’t prescribe to Ayn Rand’s world views, but that’s not the reason I don’t like it. In fact, I often really enjoy alternative perspectives in writing. It’s just that she’s so blunt about it. I dunno - maybe that’s the reason a lot of people like it! I just find it so unsatisfying to read two or three times a page about how great monopolies are and how much government sucks.

If you want me to believe what you’re writing, you have to sell it to me. What makes George Orwell so great is his ability to clearly state a message, yet also thinly veil it in symbolism and metaphor. It makes it feel genuine, not forced. Ray Bradbury does the same thing with “Fahrenheit 451”. The world feels natural, as does the message.

For “Atlas Shrugged”, though, it’s just not. The line between good and bad is so black-and-white it’s cliche, and not in a clever way either. All the characters speak in the same way too. They literally sound like they’re all the same person. Furthermore, it’s not just that the characters sound the same; all the protagonists practically have the same features!

I’m going to describe a character, and you’re going to have to tell me which one it is: They’re gaunt, have steely blue eyes, and a cold demeanor. Who is it? You can’t tell me, can you. THEYRE ALL THE SAME.

It’s really frustrating because people kept telling me how good this book was going to be. I usually love political-fiction. It’s my favorite genre, in fact. So why is this so terrible? I mean, I’ve kept reading because it’s so bad it’s almost kind of good, but then it just keeps going back to bad. I’m honestly disappointed.

Admittedly, I'm not an avid or even casual reader. I've maybe read a dozen or so books over the past 20 years. I may read 2 to 4 books in a year and then not pick another up until a few years later.

I started this book this past December. I picked it up because I'd seen/heard the title and the 'Who is John Galt?' question referenced numerous times throughout my life.

At the beginning of July, I had managed to get about half way through, leaving it sitting for weeks at a time. It was such a chore to read.

Well, with some travel and vacation time lined up, I figured I would make an effort to finish. On the last day of my vacation, I encountered "The Speech". After several pages, I wondered how long it actually was. So I leafed ahead. 55 pages?!?!

This, after such brilliant writing as to spend a page and a half to give examples of the types of passengers headed to their doom. Car 1, Room 1... Philosophy professor who taught brother love. Car 2, Room 2... An unsympathetic character deserving no sympathy. Car 3, Room 3... Someone who loved their severely disabled child despite the fact they could provide nothing to them in return... and on and on. Or, the poignant observation during one of the love scenes... She didn't know if it was possible - and, then - she knew it was.

Tedious. Overwrought. Rambling. And protagonists that seem to view themselves as gods.

I actually threw the book down when I finished. Miserable. It's a good thing I've read good books. Good luck to anyone who's opinion on reading rests on this pile.

Oh my absolute days, I’ve been listening to Atlas Shrugged (it’s a long story. I’m 27 but my high school English teacher challenged everyone in his class to read it for extra credit, no one did, I promised myself I would get through it one way or another SOMEDAY, I’m finally just making good on it) and I’ve been listening to this mfer John Galt preach at me absolutely uninterrupted for 3+ painstaking hours. Everytime I think it’s about to be done… A = A (iykyk). God I want to finish this thing to bad but if I have to listen to this man talk for too much longer I’m throwing myself out the window.

And i need a vacation from myself. I thought Aristotle was king. Now i kinda dont.

These hugely popular philosophy books in the US are not bad at all for content. But i would not consider them life changing books.

These books were not published with a long time apart and they were published in a time of cold war and economic boom for america, so i think they still answer questions that are still standing today like, what are humanity”s universal values should be after the wars or what is civilized progress really is ?

In atlas shrugged ,I didnt like the author’s overconfidence in her views, i dont think that is self esteem, its arrogance. I also didnt like the lack of relatable characters in atlas.

In zen i hated the road trip. Some parts were kinda boring when he was in the road. But i loved the quality talk, it was very education for me. I didnt have much background in philosophy except for arabic philosphy a little bit of existentialism.

English is not my native and im a novice reader from the middle east. Thank you for reading.

I'm 100 pages in to Atlas Shrugged and I absolutely hate it. I've hated it from the very beginning, but I've pushed through until now... I find all of the characters and conversations extremely hard to believe. The writing is poor, the story is slow to develop, and it feels long for the sake of being long. Is there some groundbreaking revelation coming which makes this book worth trudging through, or should I cut my losses and give up?

The ideal society that Ayn Rand exposits in her supposedly realistic novel where all of the "Men of the mind" go to flee from the oppression of the looters is a complete fantasy.

Let's start from the fact that Galt's Gulch requires a machine that produces infinite energy invented by the Gary Stu John Galt in order for any of this to work. If you need a sci-fi device for your utopian society to function, you're already starting from pretty shaky ground, it's the same flaw that Star Trek has.

Next, would some nobody like John Galt really be able to convince a couple hundred rich people, artists, judges, and entrepreneurs to abandon everything they own to go live in a hidden town in Colorado where they would have to start over from scratch?

Would a bunch of rich people used to getting their way really get along as well as portrayed in the novel? Without any real law-enforcement in place, what's to stop them from acting in their own selfish self-interest (which Rand believes is a good thing) and sabotage or even kill people that stand in their way? Especially since we've seen the protagonists use or threaten violence against the "looters". There is supposedly no real "leader" in charge of the Gulch, what happens if somebody selfishly decides that they want to be in charge now?

How do you even grow tobacco or oranges in the mountains of Colorado? Or mine all of the precious ores? Or extract all of that oil? Colorado isn't exactly the most populated state for a reason, winters will be especially bad.

Even if they have infinite energy, would a bunch of rich people be able to build all of the infrastructure in Galt's Gulch on their own? And who do the Gulchers expect to sell all of the stuff they're producing to? Our industrialized society requires thousands or workers and industries specializing in differnt supply chains and thousands upon thousands of consumers for anything to work. It's like Ayn Rand thinks that if somebody is smart enough and just starts producing stuff with willpower, they'll inevitably become rich and don't need any plebian masses.

It'll be a really long time until society recovers from the total economic and political collapse that they went out of their way to accelerate, and they can't sell anything to people without revealing their location and thus possibly getting attacked by surviving looters. So really, Galt's Gulch seems screwed in the long-term. Especially since there aren't that many women and the men we saw don't seem very interested in parenting and educating future generations. Ayn Rand herself never had kids.

So really, it makes it harder to take Ayn Rand's message seriously when she is completely incapable of proposing a realistic ideal society when given the chance. She had to make everybody in the world except for the protagonists a complete idiot, and the protagonists had reality-altering powers and for some reason had no conflict within their group whatsoever.

In conclusion, this is what would happen:

I'm listening again to the audio version for the umpteenth time and I wondered:

• what are the supposed traps in Atlas Shrugged that Harry avoided easily?

• what is the kind of person (like the Weasley twins?) that would benefit from it?

N.B.: I didn't read Atlas Shrugged

I just finished atlas shrugged and I’ve been thinking a lot about it. I wanted to throw this out to a wider community and see what kind of feedback I got.

I find Ayn Rand’s philosophy on life and people somewhat despicable and even deplorable…But I found myself really enjoying the novel as a story. I thought the melodrama was fun and exciting and character moments engaging and interesting. Am I alone in this? Most of the rhetoric I see online is just so overwhelmingly negative that I was kind of surprised. Has anyone else read it and found themselves enjoying it even while hating the message it expounds on?

Maybe I’m broken somewhere deep inside lol

So in our political studies we're talking about Libertarianism and Objectivism so, naturally, one of the books most recommended for these philosophies was Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged". The timing could not have been more hilariously perfect as i was just getting into the Bioshock series, playing through the first one for the very first time in my life in my free time between exams and during the weekend (don't judge me, i'm a 2001 kid). I've never, in my life, seen such a brutal and honest deconstruction of a book in my life, let alone from a videogame. Every time i found something within that novel which made me go "Well, that makes sense, i guess", Only for the game to tell me "Lol, no it doesn't and here's about a dozen reasons why it doesn't presented to you in the most blatant obvious form" I am not very familiar with the developers of the series since i'm a newcomer to it myself but you could tell that not only did these people read "Atlas Shrugged", they went through pain staking detail to show you how the Utopia imagined in that novel would never ever work in practice