Ayn Rand: Engineer of Souls


algernonsidney

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http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Ayn-Rand--engineer-of-souls-4385

This was a hard article, as I know very little about the authors this writer mentions. I found the article quite interesting, and it celebrates Rand's virtues and criticizes her flaws. I do wonder about his theory that Rand is mostly a Russian literary figure.

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http://www.newcriter...r-of-souls-4385

This was a hard article, as I know very little about the authors this writer mentions. I found the article quite interesting, and it celebrates Rand's virtues and criticizes her flaws. I do wonder about his theory that Rand is mostly a Russian literary figure.

It's interesting reading even tho he overcooks his thesis and is much too hard on Rand. He doesn't do much virtue celebrating either.

--Brant

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http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Ayn-Rand--engineer-of-souls-4385

This was a hard article, as I know very little about the authors this writer mentions. I found the article quite interesting, and it celebrates Rand's virtues and criticizes her flaws. I do wonder about his theory that Rand is mostly a Russian literary figure.

Some time ago I saw an article which made a point of "reminding" its readers that Rand was essentially a Russian novelist who happened to write in English.

Unfortunately, I don't remember who wrote it or where I saw it.

Jeffrey S.

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http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Ayn-Rand--engineer-of-souls-4385

This was a hard article, as I know very little about the authors this writer mentions. I found the article quite interesting, and it celebrates Rand's virtues and criticizes her flaws. I do wonder about his theory that Rand is mostly a Russian literary figure.

Chris

One wants to say that it was an interesting article, but that would not be true.

Please understand that I am not taking a second-hand offense at this as a Randroid. I value objectivity, but I dispute some of Ayn Rand's key premises myself, and as a convert to Roman Catholicism I would hardly call myself an Objectivist. But that does not stop me from recognizing the "article" as a rude, crude, anti-Rand screed, nothing more. The article's author undervalues AR's contributions to the field of philosophy, misunderstands the nature of her philosophy's power, and seems to take great pleasure in dismissing her life's work, with no more basis than his own narcissism to go on. He also ignores the effort that it takes to actually understand what someone else may say; as if to say her philosophy could be absorbed through osmosis, by reading some out-of-context quotes, rather than making the very real effort to think, to abstract, to analyze, to integrate. It reads like it could have been written by Joseph Campbell.

It appears there would be more to be gained from a different article in the same place.

steve

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