Barbara Branden

Roger, I've done as you asked: I've sent it on to a number of people. Barbara

George Smith wrote: "Another obvious error is Bertonneau's claim that Rand 'never achieved a significant screen-credit; Warner Studios even farmed out the screenplay for The Fountainhead to someone else.' In fact, Rand wrote the screenplays to both 'The Fountainhead' and 'Love Letters.'" Note how Bertonneau uses his false statement. When she appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee, Rand had most particularly wanted to testify about the communist propoganda in screenwriter Robert E. Sherwood's "The Best Years of Our Lives." Bertonneau clearly implies that her motive was envy of a more successful screenwriter's "Film Academy's accolades." "I assert," he then announces, "that Rand plausibly thought of Sherwood himself when she sent the adenoidal, second-rate playwright to his death in the Tunnel. The parallelism leads us to suspect that in the Tunnel episode Rand composes a cataclysme a clef." And in a triumph of tortured reasoning. he concludes: "And what then does Atlas become but a grand fantasy of godlike revenge, a theater of resentment assuaged, a daydream of limitless ego?" I could say more, but I'm too busy thinking of King Pentheus in Euripides' Bacchae. Barbara

Barbara, There's one easy way to understand these kinds of decisions: Ambivalence. Big-time. Robert Campbell Oops! Of course. Barbara

Robert Campbell: "Barbara, Did you see the Hickman entries for the first time in David Harriman's book? " Yes, I'd never heard of Hickman until I read the Harriman entries. And Ayn had never mentioned him. I don't expect I'll ever understand why Peikoff, in the process of removing from Ayn's statements what he preferred she had not said, left in her reaction to Hickman and her "therapeutic treatment" of Nathaniel. Barbara

Jim:: "Regardless, painting Rand as a serial killer sympathizer is way over the top." Of course it is. There are two issues we need to keep separate: what we think of Rand's attitude toward Hickman, and what the people who have long been looking for any reason to attack and destroy her and her ideas think-- or say they think. Barbara

Michael: "It's good to correct this. I looked it up to make sure." Agreed. Barbara

I just re-read something I wrote in Passion that is highly relevant here: "There was in her a deep and unnamed need to see Nathaniel and me as she did: as astonishing once-in-a-lifetime creatures. She had made us an integral part of her world; in the inner reaches of her safe haven only giants of the intellect, only giants of ability, could be admitted. Not even Ayn, with her perceptiveness and impressive powers of prediction, could see a ‘great writer’ in the few pages of a short story I wrote; not even Ayn, with her special sensitivity to intellectual creativity, could see ‘genius’ in a brilliant young man who as yet had not demonstrated his powers in action. Just as Ayn formed – as a novelist must – fantasy figures in her mind to whom she gave reality by means of fiction – just as she formed a fantasy replacement of herself and demanded to be seen as the archetype of virtue and rationality – just as she formed a fantasy replacement of Frank in the image of her novelistic heroes – so she seemed to be forming fantasy figures of Nathaniel and of me and attempting to live within that artistic conversion.” Barbara

Brant: "How can I be a victim of Ayn Rand's journal notes circa 1928? She betrayed me? She was dishonest? She lied? I'm her victim? She was a horrible person way back then? If I can get over Vietnam anyone can get over Ayn Rand, negatively speaking, and get on with their lives." Of course you weren't her victim. How she saw Hickman had nothing to do with you -- unless you believed that human beings are all-of-a-piece and that grandeur cannot coexist with self-deception. And no, she didn't betray you -- although perhaps she betrayed the best in herself. Was she dishonest in this issue? I don't know. She lied? That question seems irrelevant to this issue. She was a horrible person way back then? No, she was a mix of sensitivity and callousness, of rationality and self-deception, of realism and subjectivism -- with a titanic intellect that was sometimes overwhelmed by passionate emotions. Barbara

Steve, I, too, when I first read Rand’s Journals, knew that the issue of Hickman would one day be discovered and provide precisely the ammunition Rand-haters wanted. (I think that the material in her Journals about her functioning as Nathaniel’s therapist, presented by Valliant in his book, will eventually be discovered by psychologists and will also result in a storm of outrage.) And yes, we’re seeing overkill, as in “The only way to protect ourselves from this thinking is the way you protect yourself from serial killers: smoke the Rand followers out, make them answer for following the crazed ideology of a serial-killer-groupie, and run them the hell out of town and out of our hemisphere.” (I wonder if he also thinks we should be strangled and dismembered.) But I must also say that my blood ran cold when I read Rand’s Journal entries about Hickman. I agree with Jonathan’s statements that: “I don't like the smearing of Rand, but I understand why some people may be revolted by some of her comments. I think there is a legitimate basis for concern about some of her views as stated in her journals” – and that “her seething contempt for good people who expressed outrage about Hickman's crimes, and her claim that they had worse sins and crimes in their own lives, is reasonable grounds for very harsh criticism of her.” Good God, think what Hickman did! He raped, strangled, and dismembered a child! Think of the terror and the agony his victim endured at his hands. Would anyone care to tell her that his act was “a daring challenge to society”? Would she have admired Hickman’s “limitless daring?” Would she have agreed that “he makes you like him the whole time you are in his presence?” Brant, you wrote: ”But in the context of her life and how young she was, morally she gets a pass on this. When you write notes to yourself trying to find your way to a proper view of man for your art's sake, 95% deserves the wastebasket. You should see the crap I put on paper when I was 13 and my hormones were out of control. You should, but you won't; I tossed it.” Brant, she was not 13, she was 23 years old, She was not a child She knew exactly what Hickman had done, an act so vile. that I don't know how anyone could see it as less than the act of a thoroughly evil man, a man beyond redemption and beyond the possibility of redeeming virtues. Ginny, you wrote: ”I know Barbara keeps saying that AR was a terrific person, and on a level, I believe she was, but I've respected this woman my adult life, and this doesn't compute in my brain. And no, I don't think it's unfair for people to judge her negatively on this. God knows, she judged harshly enough." GInny, it doesn’t compute in my brain, either, And what I wrote in Passion, and have stressed again and again, is that “her virtues were larger than life – and so were her shortcomings.” Her attitude toward Hickman is surely evidence of the latter. I think we will be making a serious mistake if we attempt to counter the attacks against her – attacks which are now being echoed in endless articles, blogs, and forums – by insisting that her attitude was in any sense reasonable and understandable. It was not. It was wrong-headed and irrational. But there is a powerful defense that can be offered: that in later years she completely reversed her attitude, and that she then wrote so irrefutable a defense of reason, so incontrovertible a rejection of force, that she forever changed the lives and the thinking of millions of her readers. Barbara

Adam: "I am interested in your view of what does cause, or, what is, anti-Semitism." I recommend that you read George Gilder's brilliant new book: The Israel Test. He answered the question for me. Barbara

Apart from the very real possibility that innocent people may be executed, I have another reason for being against the death penalty. I am very uneasy about giving the governmnent -- any government -- the right, for any reason and under any circumstances, to take the life of its citizens. Barbara

Peter Taylor: "Many fans of Ayn Rand may know that she died from smoking related disease." It's not particularly relevant to this discussion, but although Rand had lung cancer in the 70s, it did not recur after her surgery. She died of congestive heart failure. However, as someone who was foolish enough to smoke for many years, I know, as every smoker knows, that we all twisted our brains into pretzels in order to avoid facing the fact that cigarettes might very well kill us. Yes, in the early 60s, when Rand said there was no poof that smoking caused cancer, it was true that there was no final, definitive, absolute, syllogistic, incontrovertible, undeniable, non-statistical, overwhelming proof. But we knew. We all knew, including Ayn Rand. With regard to any other issue, had we had the amount of evidence we had about the danger of smoking, we would have considered it more than enough evidence for us to act upon. Barbara

Jeffrey: " At any rate I did the final editing today and have also produced a cover that has a drawing of Atlas holding the world along with my name and the title on the front," It would be very wrong of you -- and possibly actionable-- to use a drawing of Atlas holding the world on his shoulders on the cover of your book; in the minds of the reading public, it is firmly associated with Ayn Rand and with her title, Atlas Shrugged Barbara

Jeff, that is superb, powerfully evocative writing. I'd forgotten how good he can be. Thanks for posting it. Barbara

Chris,is your point that everyone belongs to one or the other category? If so, I disagree, I would say that I want autonomy, relationships, and a connection to otherrs-- but not dominance or, if I understand how the term is being used here, interdependence. Barbara

Hardesty: "Rand's political mentor was Isabel Paterson, an arch-conservative and anti-Semite, according to Barbara Branden's biography". I never said, nor do I believe, that Isabel Paterson was anti-Semitic. Nor did Rand believe it. Barbara

Apropos of the significance of Israel to the world and of the attitude the world should take toward Israel, I cannot too strongly recommend George Gilder's new book. The Israel Test. The book is stunning in its brilliance and power. And it could not be more relevant to admirers of Ayn Rand; they will see throughout Gulder's defense of Israel Rand's view of civilization as the creation of the men of the mind, sustainable only to the extent that the creative individual, entrepreneurship, imagination, risk-taking, productivity, and freedom are valued. Gilder's defense of Israel is an empirical one -- but it is also a passionately moral one. Read it -- and take "the Israel test." Barbara

Jerry Biggers wrote: " Barbara Branden, who ran NBI and contracted with the lecturers, seems to have categorically denied that Peikoff ever did that lecture (from #61 in "Nathaniel's Lectures on the Basic Principles" thread: "He definitely did not write this, or any other of the Basic Principles lectures. - Barbara"). Peter Reidy wrote: "Barbara Branden denies that Peikoff gave the god lecture." I did not intend to deny that Peikoff ever gave the lecture on god -- he did give it -- , but only to deny that he wrote it. Nathaniel wrote the lecture. It may have been-- it was a long time ago, so I'm not certain of this -- that Nathaniel was ill and Peikoff substituted for him the evening of the god lecture. Barbara

When Rand sold the movie rights to The Fountainhead to Warner Brothers, she knew she was taking a terrible risk. Although she was to write the preliminary script, the studio had the legal right to make any changes to her story, her characters, her theme, that it chose; she had no control over its fate. "I would never allow a cut version of the book to be published," she explained. "That's destroying the work itself, that's Roark's Cortlandt. But a film, however bad, leaves the book intact." That;s what kept her sane, she said, during the long period of fighting to have her book faithfully bought to the screen; whatever happened with the movie, the book would be intact. . But she was wrong in thinking that her heir would have the minimum respect for her to leave her books intact. As we are seeing, many of them -- both the novels and the non-fiction -- are not intact. Peikoff has the incredible gall, the unbelievable presumption, to include within the pages of her novels his introductions, explaining her work -- and then to plaster his name all over her books. And he and his minions have stuck their dirty fingers into her written but unpublished works and changed her words as they saw fit. If they hated Ayn Rand, they could not have done anything that she would have despised more, or that would have given her as much pain. Barbara

Jay, I am truly happy that my book was important to you. Thank you for telling me. One of the greatest rewards of writing is learning that one's words have made a difference in the reader's life. Barbara

Adam: "What could possibly possess any rational, or potentially rational, human being to conclude that a general, negative "label," applied to a group of individuals, could apply to each individual within that group automatically? A rational mind would want to investigate that generalization. " I strongly disagree that a mistake in reasoning, such as you suggest, has anything whatever to do with anti-Semitism. Barbara

When I last saw Rand, in 1981, she told me that she was opposed to Reagan because she considered him a typical conservative in his attempt to link politics and religion. About his anti-abortion view, she said: "A man who does not believe in a woman's right to her own body, does not believe in human rights." Barbara

When a movie is made of a book I love, I almost always make a point of staying away from it. I've found that usually the movie takes from the book everything except that which made it good. One of the few exceptions to this is the movie of GWTW. It is remarkably faithful to the spirit, the theme, the characters, the events, and the meaning of this remarkable book. And the casting, in my view, is superb -- including the casting of Leslie Howard as Ashley Wilkes (since Frank O''Connor would not have been available). Barbara

Ba'al, the rationing of medical care will not wait until the present administration takes over the health industry. It has long been the policy of Medicare. For instance, I have recently required physical therapy, and Medicare, at my doctor's request, sanctioned a twice-weekly session with a therapist -- for seven weeks. As the remaining time grew short, I asked my therapist if there was a way to extend it. He said there was; that my doctor should send Medicare a prescription for further therapy. I consulted my doctor, and he sent in a prescription. Today, I asked my therapist if I now had another seven weeks. No, he said. It hasn't yet been approved by Medicare. Whether or not I get the therapy I need is not up to my doctor; Medicare bureaucrats must approve his prescription, and they have the totally arbitrary power to refuse it for reasons they do not have to specify. What Obamacare will achieve will be to make a bad situation infinitely worse. Barbara

Shadesofgrey wrote: "Humans are exempt (now) from most of these checks and balances because of our ability to significantly alter the environment around us with technology to suit our needs. So, if we wanted (and we appear to want to) we can theoretically go on expanding our population as long as we have the ability to feed ourselves." In fact, as science and technology in the countries with the most freedom become more and more advanced, people tend to have smaller families. The more backward a society, the more children people have. Further, we are very far from having to worry about overpopulation. Today, everyone on the planet could fit comfortably into Texas. And then, of course, there is the moon, Mars, and the rest of the galaxy. Barbara