Atlas Shrugged (Centennial Ed. HC): Centennial Edition

by Ayn Rand
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Publish Date: April 21, 2005
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Overview

This is the story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world - and did. Was he a destroyer or the greatest of liberators? Why did he have to fight his battle, not against his enemies, but against those who needed him most, and his hardest battle against the woman he loved? What is the world's motor - and the motive power of every man? You will know the answer to these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events that play havoc with the lives of the characters in this story." "Tremendous in its scope, this novel presents an astounding panorama of human life - from the productive genius who becomes a worthless playboy - to the great steel industrialist who does not know that he is working for his own destruction - to the philosopher who becomes a pirate - to the composer who gives up his career on the night of his triumph - to the woman who runs a transcontinental railroad - to the lowest track worker in her Terminal tunnels." This is a mystery story, not about the murder of a man's body, but about the murder - and rebirth - of man's spirit. It is a philosophical revolution, told in the form of an action thriller of violent events.

Author Information

Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, on February 2, 1905. At age six she taught herself to read and two years later discovered her first fictional hero in a French magazine for children, thus capturing the heroic vision which sustained her throughout her life. At the age of nine she decided to make fiction writing her career. Thoroughly opposed to the mysticism and collectivism of Russian culture, she thought of herself as a European writer, especially after encountering Victor Hugo, the writer she most admired.
During her high school years, she was eyewitness to both the Kerensky Revolution, which she supported, and--in 1917--the Bolshevik Revolution, which she denounced from the outset. In order to escape the fighting, her family went to the Crimea, where she finished high school. The final Communist victory brought the confiscation of her father's pharmacy and periods of near-starvation. When introduced to American history in her last year of high school, she immediately took America as her model of what a nation of free men could be.

When her family returned from the Crimea, she entered the University of Petrograd to study philosophy and history. Graduating in 1924, she experienced the disintegration of free inquiry and the takeover of the university by communist thugs. Amidst the increasingly gray life, her one great pleasure was Western films and plays. Long an admirer of cinema, she entered the State Institute for Cinema Arts in 1924 to study screenwriting.

In late 1925 she obtained permission to leave Soviet Russia for a visit to relatives in the United States. Although she told Soviet authorities that her visit would be short, she was determined never to return to Russia. She arrived in New York City in February 1926. She spent the next six months with her relatives in Chicago, obtained an extension to her visa, and then left for Hollywood to pursue a career as a screenwriter.

On Ayn Rand's second day in Hollywood, Cecil B. DeMille saw her standing at the gate of his studio, offered her a ride to the set of his movie The King of Kings, and gave her a job, first as an extra, then as a script reader. During the next week at the studio, she met an actor, Frank O'Connor, whom she married in 1929; they were married until his death fifty years later.

After struggling for several years at various nonwriting jobs, including one in the wardrobe department at the RKO Radio Pictures, Inc., she sold her first screenplay, "Red Pawn," to Universal Pictures in 1932 and saw her first stage play, Night of January 16th, produced in Hollywood and then on Broadway. Her first novel, We the Living, was completed in 1934 but was rejected by numerous publishers, until The Macmillan Company in the United States and Cassells and Company in England published the book in 1936. The most autobiographical of her novels, it was based on her years under Soviet tyranny.

She began writing The Fountainhead in 1935. In the character of the architect Howard Roark, she presented for the first time the kind of hero whose depiction was the chief goal of her writing: the ideal man, man as "he could be and ought to be." The Fountainhead was rejected by twelve publishers but finally accepted by the Bobbs-Merrill Company. When published in 1943, it made history by becoming a best seller through word-of-mouth two years later, and gained for its author lasting recognition as a champion of individualism.

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Customer Reviews

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Showing 1-10 of the 18 most recent reviews

1.Today's headlines or a 1956 publication?

Posted July 22, 2011 by Joe Mendicino, Lansdowne, PA

Just finished my first Ayn Rand novel "Atlas Shrugged". It took her 10 years to write beginning in 1946 with publication in 1956. Shockingly, it reads like today's headlines. It is a must read for all Americans that have become apathetic and have let this great country drift too far left of center. She clearly depicts what happens when you have a country of takers that out number the doers and how well intentioned liberal politicians systematically destroy the economy.
2.Ayn Rand, where are you now, we need you!

Posted November 24, 2010 by Michael Bowman, Tualatin OR

This book is perhaps the best book I have EVER read. Every American should read this book, and contemplate the reality she presents. America would be a much better place if John Galt were president.! God bless you Ayn Rand, your book has given me new inspiration, and has helped to stop the feeling of decay my soul has encountered in the last 15 years!
3.LONG read - worth the time

Posted July 07, 2010 by ldev, Fargo, ND

I think it's important for all of those who read this and believe that Ayn Rand was a prophet to understand that she wasn't. This was her observation of her home country (Russia) and how she saw it fall into communism. Why is that SO scary?? Because there are so many parallels to what is going on in our country today. It would be almost more comforting if she WERE a prophet, but this was futuristic view of the slow, gradual fall into socialism and ultimately communism - something that has happened over and over (and failed) in the history of other countries. The fact that SO many of the stories are SO similar to our current environment is frightening. I think every American should read this book and really think about what all of our government programs are really doing to our society. What would really happen if those who make the most money (and pay most of our bills) really did go away and stop supporting the moochers and the looters?

BTW - I skimmed through much of the 50-60 page monologe near the end. Other than that, I enjoyed the read. That section got really, really long.
4.Better than "The Brothers Karamazov"

Posted April 08, 2010 by Redding, Atlanta

This really is a good book. Please do not mind the length, all of the material was necessary for the development of the story. Well done.
5.A long read, but well worth the investment

Posted February 14, 2010 by Shawn Skillman, Columbus, Ohio

Every once in a while you come across something that has the ability to change you; your thinking style, your expressions, your choices. This book critically tells a story that does this and much more. It is indeed a long read, but well worth the investment, only if you are an active participant in the story. By this I mean you take the time to understand what Rand is trying so hard to tell you.

As I read this book, I could not help but think that it is telling of our future in the now. I look around at the people surrounding me and think only if we would use our minds we could accomplish so much more. So much of daily life is spent in an exhausting, boring routine that is demanded of us in our jobs. Is does not have to be this way. It should not be this way.

There are parts of the book that are long, but be patient. There is an underlining reason it is this way. Rand drills her concepts in hard, exceedingly slow and methodically.

From a conceptual standpoint, I would recommend reading Rand's "The Fountainhead" prior to this read.
6.The Best

Posted February 01, 2010 by tinkabell, Fredericksburg, VA

This is a truly life changing book. It is as if it were written today...not 50+ years ago. Had she known about the technology to come...I am sure she would have adjusted it somewhat but as is; it is very profetic.
I have read it three times over a long period of time. Since I read it at different ages; it has meant many different things to me. In the end it gives me the hope that no matter what happens we can survive and flourish. The individual has the option to be whatever we choose and that we are only limited by our imagination and prejudices.
7.A Love Story in a Mystery in a Message

Posted December 29, 2009 by R Hillyer, Millington, Tennessee

I get the underlying messages in this book and I agree with them, however, the love stories and the mysteries in this book make it an easy ready.

It starts with Dagny Taggart being soothed by a whistled concerto, one she's never heard before but that sounds familiar. The whistler tells her it is a concerto written by someone who has disappeared, as many of the great men of that age have done.

Dagny has a steamy affair with Henry (Hank) Rearden one that carried me quite away and made me wish for feelings so intense. But Hank steps aside when her true love appears after she chases him Nancy Drew style to the Eden he created for the great men and women of the modern age.

You sincerely want to reach in and slap silly the naysayers in the book, the ones who cry out "unfair" when good happens to others, the ones who believe they should have their share when they did nothing to create or maintain the product or service.

There's a line from Ironman (yes the movie with Robert Downey, Jr.) where Obadiah says, "Just because you invent something you think it belongs to you? Well it doesn't." That is a pretty concise telling of the socialist view most of the characters in the book have.
8.A "must read" for every patriotic American

Posted December 18, 2009 by Michael The Patriot, Glendale, California

I first read this book in 1966. Back then it appeared to be a work of fiction. Now, nearly 44 years later, it must be viewed as two separate phenomena. The first is as a clearly stated prophesy. Ayn Rand was absol;utely a prophet. She saw clearly where this country was headed, and her prophesy has proved, unfortunately, to have been entirely accurate. The second is that it provides a virtual "how-to" manual for today's communist government. Each day that passes makes me more certain that the current resident of the White House either has read this book himself, or has had one of his cabal do so.

Anyone who fancies himself a true patriot should consider this book required reading. If enough real Americans are moved to read this amazing work, and if enough of those who read it are willing to apply the principles epsoused in it, we stand at least a chance of taking out country back from the communistic conspiracy that hijacked the government beginning during the FDR era and now attempting to be concluded by the Obama conspiracy.

A true understanding of this wonderful book results in a true understanding of the communist mind and of the anti-American intentions of the Obama administration.

All hail Ayn Rand, a TRUE American patriot.
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Posted May 26, 2008 by , Newport Beach, CA
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Posted April 23, 2008 by , Portland, OR