Ayn Rand¹ is a Russian-born American writer, whose unusual philosophy, Objectivism, has won worldwide adherents. Miss Rand worked as a script writer for RKO Pictures in the 1930s, before going on to write several fiction and non-fiction works outlining her philosophy. Her best known work is Atlas Shrugged.

Miss Rand was born on 2 February, 1905, in St Petersburg, Russia. She witnessed first hand, at the age of 13, the Worker's Revolution by the Bolsheviks, which brought communism to power in Russia. She decided at that age to devote her life to the freeing of men under all forms of statism. At the age of 21, in 1926, she came to New York to visit relatives, and stayed there, escaping from her homeland. She got her first job at RKO Pictures, under the director Cecil B DeMille. She worked as a movie extra and as a script reader. Her first novel, We the Living was published in 1936. She had spent her free weekends plotting and writing it. She then went on to write several screenplays for RKO, including Red Pawn, which was never produced. During the 1960s and '70s, Miss Rand lectured at several colleges and lecture halls, which was the basis for the Objectivist Newsletter². Miss Rand died 6 March, 1982, at the age of 77.

What is Objectivism?

Objectivism is the name that Miss Rand gave to her philosophy. It derives its name from the root of the philosophy that all life must be studied objectively. The study of ethics, morals, values, and politics must be seen by the observer objectively. This is the back bone of her philosophy. She says that every man is an individual, no one should live for the sake of another, and that reason and your thinking mind is your highest virtue. What is stated expressly is that no man could or should live for another man, and that a sense of joy is vitally crucial to live life to its fullest. In other words, man's capacity for joy is the greatest emotion in the world. Joy is the true meaning of life. It comes in as many different forms as there are people, and no two are the same. Be it an architect designing a building, a mother caring for her children, or a man who delights in climbing mountains, the connecting factor of these is joy.

You can visit The Ayn Rand Institute, to see a fuller version of the bibliography. There are also several informative articles and links at that site.

A Brief Bibliography

Miss Rand's works spread from the brilliant prose of Atlas Shrugged, to the scathing rhetoric of The Virtue of Selfishness. The list of her books is relatively short, but powerful. They are in order of publishing dates.

• We the Living, 1936
• The Fountainhead, 1943
• Anthem, 1945
• Atlas Shrugged, 1957
• For the New Intellectual, 1961
• The Virtue of Selfishness, 1964
• Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal, 1966
• The Romantic Manifesto, 1970
• The New Left: The Anti-Industrial Revolution, 1971
• Introduction to the Objectivist Epistemology, 1979.

She also wrote a play entitled, The Night of January 16th³. It opened in 1935 for a six month run, and is revived occasionally.

The Fountainhead

The Fountainhead is described by Miss Rand as an, 'Overture to Atlas Shrugged'. It focuses on the story of an intransigent young man who struggles to succeed against near insuperable odds. It is the story of those who are creators, why they are so desperately needed, and why the people of this world treat them so brutally. He fights his hardest battle against the woman who loves him.

Atlas Shrugged

Atlas Shrugged is the story of the world in a time where the people who move the world go on strike. The best-remembered line from the book is, 'Who is John Galt?'. It is a hefty read, at approximately 1,100 pages. The story revolves around Dagny Taggart, the railroad heiress who fights a losing battle to keep her work and world from crumbling. It is a brilliant fictional account of a philosophy that is extremely demanding.