Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged: A Philosophical and Literary Companion,   ISBN:9780754655497

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Regardless of how one feels about Rand's "philosophy" it is inarguable that she is a terrible, terrible writer. Her lack of skill and artistry, her bloated sentences, paragraphs and chapters make Atlas Shrugged something to be endured. If you are eighteen-year old Republican you will love it. If you are, on any level, a discerning reader you will feel cheap and dirty by the second chapter.

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A very good and helpful discussion of one of the most important books of the 20th century. It has a very good plot summary. Do not read this book until you read Atlas Shrugged.

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Behind every louder-than-life critic of Marxism is someone who never read Marx and, here's dialectics for you, behind every ranting opponent of Objectivism is someone who never read Ayn Rand. Until now. Atlas Shrugged is sure more entertaining than anything Lenin ever wrote ~ namely, sexy scenes. But Rand and the Soviets she hates so passionately do share similar literary techniques. Such as the whole idealist approach to depicting "reality as it could/ should be." Not to mention a very blunt didactic tongue. And let's not forget a definite measure of misanthropic superiority. Reductionist revenge! And why not? Rand came out of the U.S.S.R. Of course, she wanted to turn the tables upon her ideological opponents so why not use metaphors of labor (the strike), liberals (utopian society), anarchists (totalitarian nihilism) and even AA (hitting bottom) to make her "radical" points? But the main deal is Rand is an excellent storyteller and her prose is page-turning. Atlas Shrugged is noir, top to bottom ~ Orson Wells should have done the movie (with Charlton Heston as John Galt) ~ as well as vaguely sci-fi (Robert Heinlein comes to mind). Plus, there's feminism all over the place (Dagny Taggart runs the railroad), polyamory (gets frisky with 3 protagnonists, including Galt) and, even cooler, Galt's motor gizmo, using no fossil fuels, is totally Green. 1957 no less. Some of the pulpier passages, combined with the prevailing atmosphere of bureaucratic defilement and technological horror (Thompson harmonizer, Ferris Persuader) surpasses Orwell's 1984 and even invokes Burroughs' Nova Express. Hot damn. And the climatic action scene which ends the book ~ X-Men meets X-Files. Kitsch-i-licious! Whether or not you subscribe to Rand's deregulationist capitalism (the U.S. railroad system was paid for by taxpayers, you know), this is way more fun than the band Rush who Rand couldn't endure hearing. Rand hated rock n roll. So did Lenin.

0 of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 people found the following review helpful.

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There are many different themes in this book. Most notable are the tones of capitalism vs. communism and the the producers in society vs. those who mooch off of the government.

Dagny Taggart is the female protagonist. This is a story about one person's fight against government corruption and greed. As an executive for one of the biggest railroads in the country run by her brother, she is frustrated by the lack of production from other workers until she runs into Henry Rearden, a scientist who has created his own metal plant and through many hours of hard work has grown the company to be one of the best in the industry. The two discover they have a lot of ideas in common in regards to work ethic and business practices.

Against Dagny and Henry (and many other industry giants introduced in the book) is the government which believes that they should share the wealth they have created for themselves from their own hard work with the rest of the world. In addition, they should share the secrets of their success with the rest of the world so that other companies can produce the same product without having to put in the same amount of work.

John M. Vanderslice

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The title of the book makes it sound like it is the original book, but is actually a study of the actual book. I had to return this book and reorder the actual "Atlas Shrugged" book.