Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Ouch!

This comment stolen from a Libertarian blog I read, and the commenter claims to have stolen it from someone else:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

Most of the Ayn Rand fans I know are hip enough to find this funny. And actually, Libertarians and Ayn Rand fans usually get along well these days since they have many of the same goals. Though Ayn Rand herself wrote snarky things about libertarians in the 1950's and those who are fundamentalist about her work tend to miss that those criticisms really no longer apply decades later.

But it still made me chuckle.

CC
who knows you saw the punchline coming, but bet you smiled anyway.

Full disclosure: I did my couple of months of reading Ayn Rand when I was 17 and I never made it through Lord of the Rings at all.

13 comments:

Joel Monka said...

You win your bet. I couldn't make it through LOTR when I was in school either, but tried again recently and managed it. (it wasn't worth the effort, though) Should I have another go at GWTW, another book I could never finish?

Mickbic said...

I am struggling through THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES right now.

After being dissatisfied with THANK GOD FOR EVOLUTION I felt it was time to go to the source.

Strange Attractor said...

Joel, I love Gone With the Wind. It was definitely worth it when I was a thirteen year old girl. I just returned Drood to the library unfinished though. I just couldn't make it through.

CC, love the joke. I will immediately share it with my libertarian friends.

PG said...

I went through a full-on Randian/ libertarian phase when I was a freshman in high school (when I was transitioning from being politically conservative) until the beginning of my senior year of high school. This means I've read more Ayn Rand (not only her fiction, but also her nonfiction essays) than the average libertarian. Of her fiction, "We the Living" is not bad. Her essays on aesthetics (mostly collected in The Romantic Manifesto) are interesting, but take her inherent belief of "If you don't like what I like, you're evil" into the even-more-problematic-than-politics realm of aesthetic preferences.

Bill Baar said...

I've missed both.

LinguistFriend said...

I read through three volumes of the Lord of the Rings in three days, at some point in early college. I've looked at Ayn Rand, but could not read it.

Chuchundra said...

Here's the original source

http://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/2009/03/ephemera-2009-7.html

I read Atlas Shrugged as a junior in high school. I've read LOTR three or four times.

Toonhead said...

I've read LOTR but currently stuck on Atlas Shrugged. I'm in the last section but I can't seem to get through this wall. I've completed 6 marathons but I can't find the strength to finish a book! I feel sorry for Jennie (from the link that led to the comment). I sort of read the Fountainhead & read all of We the Living in high school. Rand can warp a young mind like no other.

kimc said...

I don't think your joke is a joke. I've read all of LOTR, The Hobbit, and several of Ayn Rand's novels.
The main thing I noticed about Rand's characters is that most of them are all good or all bad and the few who are in between, that is, human, invariably commit suicide. I felt her whole series was a recommendation of suicide.

kimc said...

By the way, I liked Gone With the Wind too, and it's sequel. Scarlett reminds me of my mother.

PG said...

I like GWTW, despite its problems, but I really disliked the sequel "Scarlett." I advise people NOT to read it if they enjoyed GWTW -- it just busts up the characters Margaret Mitchell created.

"I felt her whole series was a recommendation of suicide."

Nah, the kind of people who can get through those books are convinced they're basically on the side of good and everyone who doesn't like them must be on the side of evil. It's part of the reason Rand works on more people while they're in high school -- it's hitting the social loser kids (and I totally count myself among them) right at the time that they want to feel superior to the cool kids. People who remain Rand fans into adulthood are those who didn't get over that impulse. You don't want to know how many Ayn-Rand-fan message boards that include personal ads have something along the lines of "looking for my Dominique."

Jess said...

My little brother read Atlas Shrugged and turned into an asshole, quoting at length to justify some pretty awful behavior. He seems to be getting better as the years pass.

kimc said...

PG -- I guess that means I didn't identify enough with the heroes or villains....