Book Review: Finished

After 3 1/2 weeks I'm finally finished. I completely neglected my kids and house but I have no regrets. It's one of the best books I've ever read. All the while I was reading I was saying to myself, "She's almost as good as Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky [my favorite authors]." Then, when googling her, I was not entirely surprised to find that she was Russian by birth and American by choice. She's not quite as good as her fellow Russians at character development and a certain literary quaility that I define to myself as mundane clarity, at which Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky are masters. But she is definitely better than most and her philosophy is amazingly persuasive. I feel like I used to feel in college when I learned something new from someone great. How I used to feel when I learned something from Newton or Mendell--admiration for their ability to discover and pride in my ability to understand.

The book was originally described to me as political but I found it to be much more philosophical. Ostensibly, it follows the descent of America into Socialism and its destruction by its twisted moral code sped along by the voluntary removal of men of ability from society. Underneath, the novel is a vehicle for the declaration of her personal moral philosophy which is what gave the characters a bit of an allegorical feel. She's a brilliant essayist but almost as brilliant at fiction as she made a very powerful love story out of logical thinking scientists and industrialists.

I said before that it seemed she was saying that the only honest and true thing was industrialism but by the end she goes way beyond that to proclaim that the highest values are human achievement and human self-esteem.

She changed several of my opinions that I'd believed I solidly held, she also strengthened others by naming and clarifying the reasons behind them. One of her surprising feats is that she strengthened and clarified the principles of my religion even though she was vehemently opposed to organized religion. Not so surprising, though, if you go by the tenet that truth supports truth. A tenet I think she would agree with as one of her philosophical absolutes is that A=A, or exsistence exists. Another surprise is that although she demolished, for the most part, my Socialist leanings, her philosophy of government supports my endorsement of a government health care system and explains why it has worked in other free countries. I don't know if she would agree with that. :)

In conclusion, if you want to be wowed by a piece of literature and can afford to vacate yourself from life for about a month then read Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

Disclaimer: Several of my co-book clubbers thoroughly disliked the book and didn't continue to read it after the first third. One was already passionately a lazy fair capitalist (I know I spelled that wrong, I just like to) and felt the book was overkill on opinions she already held. However, I think she gave up too early as the book goes far beyond pro-capitalism/anti-Socialism into a complete philosophy on the morality of life. Plus the plot just gets more interestingly action thrillerish as the book goes on. Another, couldn't go past some early disturbing references to sex. Again, I think she gave up too early as these early disturbing references were made not to endorse their smuckiness but to later pinpoint their disturbingness. Although, I will say that I, also, am not a fan of sex in literature and that while I can see the necessity of the references to her point, those references could have been more vague to the same effect.

Book Review: Atlas Shrugged

This is the book I'm reading for book club this month. It's 1100 pages so it's debatable whether I will finish it on time. It is, apparently, a classic, although I've never heard of it before. Which only means I'm hopelessly uninformed because it absolutely reads like a classic.

The forward, written by some Ayn Rand expert, mentions that she believes strongly in objectivism. I'm not sure what that entails yet, because he also warns that if you continue reading the forward it will ruin the book by revealing its surprises. So I didn't read any more of the forward. But I'm looking forward to reading it in the future because I am interested in what Ayn Rand is getting at in her book. She very obviously has an agenda. She is an excellent writer so her characters are complex enough to be real, and yet they have the box-y feel of an allegory.

So far, I disagree strongly with her seeming premise, which ,as far as I can tell, is that the only real and honest thing is industrialism. Progress. The unabashed quest for money. Her best characters belong in this camp. Her weak and pitiable characters are in the camp of philanthropy and social consciousness. And yet they aren't, because it's apparent that they only give lip service to those ideals. Truly, they desire power and money as much as the strong characters, but they are too weak to be true to the "industrial ideal" and their sin lies in the fact that they hide their jealousy and weakness behind a false "good of society" attitude.

The allegory seems to follow an Adam Smith path. Namely, "by pursuing his own interest, [the individual] frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he intends to promote it."

In other words those who claim to promote the interest of society are hypocrites and will cause harm to society in the end. And those who openly operate on the principle of self-interest ultimately further the good of society and are the better people because they are true to their natures.

However, I am only 100 pages into the book. Which means I still have 10/11 ths of the book to read, which means that I fully expect that Ms. Rand is not so predictable that she would allow me to figure out the whole premise of the book in the first 100 pages and that I will have to change my opinion in the future.

To be continued.......

In honor of Valentine's Day

I would now like to recount the touching story of Grant's and my engagement.

Grant had made it clear many times that he would like to get married. And though I loved him and we'd talked of marriage in our future I had made it clear that I wasn't ready to go there (as in engagement) yet. You see, getting engaged was just embarrassing. BYU was over for the regular school year and I was off to Texas for a 10 week Molecular Biology camp thingie. Grant and I tearfully said our goodbyes for the duration of the summer. Then my mother came to Utah (I can't remember why) and we were driving to my grandparent's house. Mom, like all moms, dug for details on my life and I confessed that Grant and I would probably get married, maybe December.... Then, Mom proceeded to tell me how summer is such a better time. More people could attend, weather wouldn't be an issue, there is only a two week Christmas vacation between semesters, etc., etc. In the end I agreed to get married in the summer. Let me make this abundantly clear. My mother talked me into getting married. We got to my grandparents house, I called Grant and said, "Um, do you want to get married this summer after I get back from Molecular Biology camp." And Grant said, "Are you serious?" And that was how it happened. I know you are all reeling from the romanticism.

Now, before you go and feel all guilty, Mom, I would like to assert that Grant is very happy for your intervention.
Hee hee.

Hooray for leaky borders!

Yeah, I know the economic problems caused by the influx of our Southern neighbors and that's not so great. But, on the other hand, the vast increase in the numbers of Mexicans in our country means we now have a prayer of getting decent food, even in rural America. I found pig's feet at our local (extremely) small town supermarket and fixed them for dinner. It was a good day.

P.S. If you're not jealous, you should be.