The best part of the monologue is in-universe, it supposedly takes 3 hours, but everyone on YouTube takes 4-5 hours, which means John Galt was speaking at 1.5x speed.
Honestly Ayn Rand's sexual politics are more interesting than her economic politics. The books are mostly about masculinity and its definition. The ideal men in her books are immutable flawless beings, and the (good) women learn to define themselves by dating progressively better men.
In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny goes from Francisco d'Anconia (no ambition playboy) to Hank Rearden (ambitious steel magnate that's a slave to the state) to John Galt (genius that refuses to compromise on anything). Dagny achieves fulfillment by collecting personality traits from the people she dates—which ultimately leads to her realization she is the one responsible for her own self-actualization (kind of contradictory lol).
The Fountainhead engages with this more, because the conformist Keating is portrayed as more harmful than the physically abusive Roark.
I'm convinced Ayn Rand defined the "sigma male" and she'll get no credit for it as a woman. She engages with the concept much more than the manosphere, because her sigma males end up poor, homeless, and societally unsuccessful because of their inability to compromise.
Contrast the dream sold to young men on social media, which is "not compromising on anything will make you rich and attractive!"
I don't agree with Rand's value system but she accurately describes what happens to people that hate compromise. The only reason why one would be a sigma is if one prioritizes "being right" over every other aspect of one's life.
Like I said, it was a million years ago, and I was a teenager so I didn’t really engage with the material as deeply as you seem to have. But I vaguely recall Roark being the main viewpoint character in the Fountainhead, while Dagny was in Atlas, right?
I think that is one thing I enjoyed about the Fountainhead, it felt a little more grounded because, even though the main character is this egoist superman guy, we at least are with him as he’s having a bad time.
I just remember Gault being this rumor hiding off in the wilderness or whatever, then he shows up with his sci-fi engine, drops pages and pages of dialogue, and… wins? I forget how it ends for him, tbh.
> But I vaguely recall Roark being the main viewpoint character in the Fountainhead, while Dagny was in Atlas, right?
iirc the Fountainhead has two viewpoints, Roark (heroic architect) and Dominique (Roark's lover). My belief is that Roark is a fake protagonist. It's Dominique who undergoes most of the character growth, as she learns to accept Roark's heroism.
Roark gets kicked out of architecture school for not designing in a neoclassical style, then continually loses jobs or has to fight others to achieve his vision. He's suffering like a protagonist, but it doesn't actually lead to him changing like a protagonist. His struggles are generally the same—trying to design buildings and having his designs criticized/ruined on superfluous grounds.
Contrast Dominique who goes from Keating (mediocrity) to Wynand (societal success) to Roark (self-actualized man). Dominique's the one who redeems herself by the end of the book.
> I just remember Gault being this rumor hiding off in the wilderness or whatever, then he shows up with his sci-fi engine, drops pages and pages of dialogue, and… wins? I forget how it ends for him, tbh.
Galt invented a perpetual motion machine (supposedly not one) but refuses to give it to pseudo-Communist America and spends all his time doing manual labour. Society collapses because Galt starts a movement to make the genius capitalists of the world go on strike, then he makes a speech at the end to flex on everyone as the world descends into anarchy.
The funniest part is the speech has no relevance to the plot. Society would collapse regardless of Galt making the speech. The speech convinces the government to let Galt take over the country to fix it, but Galt tells the government to pound sand.
The ending of the book is a complete societal collapse so Galt can rebuild from scratch.
Ironically Galt shares his strategy with the Argentinian Trotskyist J. Posadas, who wanted the Soviets to start a nuclear war since the destruction of society would allow the workers to rise up.
Honestly Ayn Rand's sexual politics are more interesting than her economic politics. The books are mostly about masculinity and its definition. The ideal men in her books are immutable flawless beings, and the (good) women learn to define themselves by dating progressively better men.
In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny goes from Francisco d'Anconia (no ambition playboy) to Hank Rearden (ambitious steel magnate that's a slave to the state) to John Galt (genius that refuses to compromise on anything). Dagny achieves fulfillment by collecting personality traits from the people she dates—which ultimately leads to her realization she is the one responsible for her own self-actualization (kind of contradictory lol).
The Fountainhead engages with this more, because the conformist Keating is portrayed as more harmful than the physically abusive Roark.
I'm convinced Ayn Rand defined the "sigma male" and she'll get no credit for it as a woman. She engages with the concept much more than the manosphere, because her sigma males end up poor, homeless, and societally unsuccessful because of their inability to compromise.
Contrast the dream sold to young men on social media, which is "not compromising on anything will make you rich and attractive!"
I don't agree with Rand's value system but she accurately describes what happens to people that hate compromise. The only reason why one would be a sigma is if one prioritizes "being right" over every other aspect of one's life.