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I've read most of her works, even earlier more obscure ones such as Anthem. Don't get me wrong, I don't doubt the power of what she wrote but how she wrote it gave me a giggle at the time, even as a starry-eyed libertarian at the time, who welcomed her message with open arms. The stereotypical Randian protagonist hopping on a soapbox for a chapter-long tortured soliloquy is sort of funny, you've got to admit.

The stereotypical Randian protagonist hopping on a soapbox for a chapter-long tortured soliloquy is sort of funny, you've got to admit.

Yes, I remember Anthem, which I tried but found unreadable.

Also We The Living, about life in Communist Russia, was not very good. Those two (Anthem and We The Living) were among her earliest works, weren't they?

She was — in one instance that I know of — capable of actually being funny.

That was when — in The Fountainhead — damaged billionaire hero Gail Wynand is conversing with collectivist bad-guy Ellsworth Toohey:

Toohey had expected Wynand to call for him after the interview with Dominique. Wynand had not called. But a few days later, meeting Toohey by chance in the city room, Wynand asked aloud:

"Mr. Toohey, have so many people tried to kill you that you can't remember their names?"
Toohey smiled and said: "I'm sure quite so many would like to."
"You flatter your fellow men," said Wynand, walking away.

That really made me laugh, the when I read it as a twenty-year-old.