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April 23, 2007
Popular Books
'Atlas' At 50 by KEVIN WALKER reveals some interesting stats about favorite books of the last century:
More than 700,000 copies of Rand's books sold in 2006, 25 years after her death. Several years ago, when the Modern Library published readers' choices for the best novels of the 20th century, four books by Rand made the list: "Atlas Shrugged" (No. 1), "The Fountainhead" (No. 2), "Anthem" (No. 7) and "We the Living" (No. 8).
A survey in 1991 by the Library of Congress and the Book of the Month Club found "Atlas Shrugged" the second most influential book in the United States. The Bible was first.
One can see how some of this plays well to certain elements of the Republican Party - Rush Limbaugh is a fan; so was Ronald Reagan. But Rand also offers ideas that appeal to the independent-minded regardless of political affiliation. *** She makes this clear in the (lengthy) speech she gives John Galt, the mysterious central character in "Atlas Shrugged": "Man's basic vice, the source of all his evils, is that nameless act of blanking out, the willful suspension of one's consciousness, the refusal to think - not blindness, but the refusal to see, not ignorance, but the refusal to know." *** In another words, letting others do your thinking for you.
Posted by Post Scripts at April 23, 2007 08:05 PM