I went into this book with low expectations, my teachers had recommended it, and my class was forced to read it, so how good could it be? I went into this book, Ayn Rand’s “Anthem”, with low expectations, and I left with a lowered respect for humanity and individuality. And a hatred for Ayn Rand’s bland boorish literature, which ranks her as one of the most over-hyped writers in my recent memory.
I used to like stories like this and that’s one of the many reasons why I hate “Anthem” so. Novels like George Orwell’s �” where perfectly gritty and shocking enough to stir emotions deep down inside the reader, they had something. Ms. Rand tries and fails miserably at writing a decent story on a simple premise; the values of individuality.
So let me give you a back-story, or rather the whole story of “Anthem”. The setting is the ‘future dark ages’ a time when everybody is exactly the same and people say “we” instead of “I”. They live in a world that has technologically regressed to its fundamentals, candles, glass, and torches are big innovations.
Here I find one my biggest hang-ups, Rand tries too hard to shock the readers into thinking ‘Wowie! This setting must suck a lot, I wonder if anything could ever happen to shake up this crazy world?!’ with her lines like “they taught us the newest scientific advancements, like how the Sun revolved around the Earth and how the Earth was the center of the universe” which is just to blunt and stupid for the likes of preschoolers. Anyway...
From the depths rises Equality! A bland underwritten hero of sorts who has an insatiable need for knowledge. This leads him on many misadventures (A.K.A. Plot devices) which he travels through like a gauntlet to achieve Ayn Rand’s purpose. He discovers electricity, and is exiled because he did it by himself. He finds a mate, and they travel off into the “uncharted forest” to start a new society, one which will take back the old-world through force.
Besides being unimaginative and poorly written, Rand’s characters are mere coat hangers for her to use at her whim; they are bland and static. This would not be a problem, if the villains where such faceless morons that we all love to hate, but the main characters are not thought out at all. They show no expression, nor individuality, which in her mind seems to be the reasoning. After all, they DO live in a faceless society, but her problem is that they where the chosen few that where supposed to break the mold, there fore they are in dire need of expression. This is FLAW #1.
And what little characterization there is evil and stupid. Equality ends up sounding like a Hitler wanna-be whom is willing to retake the old-world through force, a world war. He ends up sounding as pig headed and unreasonable as his enemies and Ayn Rand herself. This, my friends, is FLAW #2.
Her story has so many plot holes that it loses what believability and momentum it hand built up. Which is little. Equality is flirting with his love interest Liberty while he is supposed to be doing his job (street sweeper) and so are she, but neither of them gets caught? No, no, no, that would be too interesting and complicated for children above three years old. When he is put into prison he escapes, but not because he tricks his guards, but because the jail is unguarded! Presumably because nobody has tried to escape before, but the book tells tales of other before equality whom rebelled (like the “Saint in the Fire), one would assume that the civilization would wizen up after the first hundred years. And when the two are walking in the forest Equality magically conjures fire that burns all night long to keep the various beasts at bay, yeah right. Plot Holes; Flaw #3.
Perhaps the biggest flaw is Ayn Rand’s philosophy, which she tries to sell in this book. Objectivism is the theory of rioters, and she tries to turn it into something heroic, and doesn’t do a good job doing that. The book I had had several pages of advertisements for books on her phony philosophy, which was enough to make me blanch. You sell books, not you ideas, and that has always been an opinion of mine. What would happen if George Orwell tried to sell his ideas about capitalism to his readers? He would have been discredited as pretentious, which is just what Ayn Rand is. This if FLAW #4.
But there is an upside, the book is amazingly short, only 100 or so pages in my copy. And I’m pretty sure you could get a decent price on it, considering your buying trash.
So, I am not going to recommend this book. It is shallow, pompous, and boring. Spend your money on �”, “Animal Farm”, or one of Ayn Rand’s Other books if you want something way better. Don’t waste your time with this garbage.
Rand was a Russian born American author who pioneered the philosophy of objectivism. Anthem is a futuristic science fiction novella. Man is in a dark ...More at Buy.com
Rand was a Russian born American author who pioneered the philosophy of objectivism. Anthem is a futuristic science fiction novella. Man is in a dark ...More at Buy.com
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