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Anthem | ||
| Author: | Ayn Rand | ||
| ISBN: | 0451191137 | ||
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This centennial edition of Anthem, celebrating the controversial and enduring legacy of its author, features an introduction by Rand's literary executor, Leonard Peikoff, which includes excerpts from documents by Ayn Rand - letters, interviews, and journal notes in which she discusses Anthem. This volume also includes a complete reproduction of the original British edition with Ayn Rand's handwritten editorial changes and a Reader's Guide to her writings and philosophy. Anthem ANNOTATION This expanded edition of Ayn Rand's classic tale of a future dark age of the great "We"--in which individuals have no name, no independence, and no values--is a beautifully written, powerful novel that projects current social trends into the future, and anticipates such later Rand masterpieces as The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. FROM THE PUBLISHER The year 2005 marks Ayn Rand¿¿¿s Centennial Year. Ayn Rand¿¿¿s classic tale of a future dark age of the great ¿¿¿We¿¿¿¿¿¿a world that deprives individuals of name, independence, and values¿¿¿anticipates her later masterpieces, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Author Bio: Born February 2, 1905, Ayn Rand published her first novel, We the Living, in 1936. Anthem followed in 1938. It was with the publication of The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957) that she achieved her spectacular success. Ms. Rand¿¿¿s unique philosophy, Objectivism, has gained a worldwide audience. The fundamentals of her philosophy are put forth in the nonfiction books Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, The Virtue of Selfishness, and Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. FROM THE CRITICS Library Journal The difference between this long-forgotten exercise in paranoia and other futuristic visions of a world controlled by the state, such as Aldous Huxley's or George Orwell's, is the extremist tone of Rand's story. The author lived in a black-and-white world in which things social or communal are evil and things individual and selfish are exalted. This "anthem" culminates in a hymn to the concepts of "I" and "ego," where the rebels are those who resist group action; the oppressors are government officials and others who attempt to provide a safety net for the less fortunate. The production is not improved by the theatricality of narrator Paul Meier, which is reminiscent of a ham Victorian actor intoning an overwrought melodrama. Not recommended.-Mark Pumphrey, Polk Cty. P.L., Columbus, NC
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