Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

To: Talisker

Dostoevsky and Hemingway are known for their prose and conveying human experience, not their political theory and speculative fiction. I think Rand’s story-telling is better than Slate gives her credit for, but we’re hardly discussing the value of her prose.

In other words, Dostoevsky and Hemingway describe the human condition; Rand makes diagnoses. If I criticize Rand for making false diagnoses, it’s silly to say that Dostoevsky and Hemingway aren’t medical experts, either.


103 posted on 11/03/2009 6:01:22 AM PST by dangus (Nah, I'm not really Jim Thompson, but I play him on FR.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 57 | View Replies ]


To: dangus
In other words, Dostoevsky and Hemingway describe the human condition; Rand makes diagnoses. If I criticize Rand for making false diagnoses, it’s silly to say that Dostoevsky and Hemingway aren’t medical experts, either.

Your use of the word "diagnosis" is a straw man - one could just as easily ask where Rand purported to be, as you put it, a "medical expert." The "human condition" that Dostoevsky and Hemingway describe is that of the individual fighting against personal cowardice and relying on their own integrity rather than giving in to coercion and fear. Dostoevsky, especially, pits people against these things as represented by government tyranny. These "human conditions" are identical with ALL of the focus of Rand's work. To separate Rand - to separate The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and the singular focus of Objectivism to protect against collectivist tyranny - from the "human condition," is not only absurd, but deliberately disingenuous.

146 posted on 11/03/2009 10:26:11 PM PST by Talisker (When you find a turtle on top of a fence post, you can be damn sure it didn't get there on it's own.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 103 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson