In which I consider Atlas Shrugged for some reason
Fifteen or so years ago I managed to read Ayn Rand’s magnum opus Atlas Shrugged, and by read, I mean listened to the unabridged book on tape while driving back to school from Southern California to Boulder, Colorado. The thing was something like 24 tapes in all and consumed the entire drive and then some. And you know what? It was totally worth it. I didn’t ever want to stop driving, though that was primarily because the book was narrated by Edward Herrmann. He should do the voice work for all audio books.
The actual book is something like 1,200 pages of minuscule type. Buried in those pages is an engaging mystery story, the central question of which is, of course, Who is John Galt? Unfortunately it’s mostly lost in the philosophical diatribes the various characters spew ad nauseum. I’m sympathetic to Rand’s individualistic worldview but its tenets have no business in a novel, at least not spelled out so explicitly and in such tiresome detail by otherwise interesting characters.
Of the book, my friend Graham put it best: “If you can’t tell me what you want to in less than 500 pages, I don’t want to hear what you have to say.” Unless you’re a Russian and your last name is Tolstoy or Dostoevsky, that’s some sage advice.
