FReeper Book Club: Atlas Shrugged, The Non-Commercial

A Publius Essay | 21 February 2009 | Publius

[Publius]

Part I: Non-Contradiction
Chapter VI: The Non-Commercial

Synopsis

Hank Rearden, forgetting about his anniversary party, is sent home by his secretary and dresses for the party. He reads an editorial about the Equalization of Opportunity Bill, which will forbid any businessman from owning more than one business. He has paid Wesley Mouch a lot of money to stop this and cannot believe it will pass the National Legislature.

Hank goes downstairs in time to hear Simon Pritchett state that man is nothing but chemicals with delusions of grandeur. He also says that there aren’t any objective standards and that the purpose of philosophy is to prove that there isn’t any meaning to life.

Balph Eubank pontificates on the state of literature, which should be to show that the essence of life is suffering and defeat. He suggests an equalization of opportunity bill for authors. Mort Liddy challenges this, but Eubank believes that no book should be allowed to sell more than ten thousand copies, thus forcing people to buy better books because there will no longer be any best sellers. Only those who are not motivated by making money should be allowed to write.

Bertram Scudder, author of a vile and slanderous article about Rearden, speaks in favor of the Equalization of Opportunity Bill to Philip Rearden and Betty Pope, who both support it. Philip has no problem with the government trimming Hank’s fortune. They are joined by Claude Slagenhop who argues that if the people are in need, they should seize things first and talk about it later.

Dagny Taggart walks in, and she is breathtaking. She tells Hank that this is a celebration of the first sixty miles of Rearden Metal track. Hank is strangely formal, as though he and Dagny have never met. Dagny is disturbed by his treatment of her.

Eubank and Jim Taggart speak about Dagny, whom Eubank sees as a perversion caused by the age of machines; Dagny should be home weaving cloth and having babies. Hank is enraged to see that Bertram Scudder is drinking in his house, but he is even more upset when Francisco d’Anconia walks in.

Francisco gravitates to Eubank and Pritchett. Eubank wants a government subsidy for the arts. Francisco delivers a delicious slam against Pritchett’s nihilism with a smile.

Jim takes Francisco aside to discuss the San Sebastian debacle, about which Francisco intends to do nothing. He tells Jim that the mines and rail line have been seized by the will of the people, and how dare anyone go against the majority? Everything Francisco did in Mexico was intended to follow the dominant precepts of the age. The mining engineer was chosen because of his need, workers received wages for producing nothing, and not a penny of profit was made. What could better epitomize the philosophy of Jim Taggart?

Francisco takes Hank aside and manages to read Hank’s innermost thoughts. He explains to Hank that he is carrying all the freeloaders in the room, and they have but one weapon against him. Hank gives him a tongue lashing about the Mexican business, and Dagny cannot believe that Francisco is taking it without fighting back. Francisco leaves, telling Hank he has learned what he needed to learn about him.

Dagny draws Hank into conversation, but Hank is still absolutely rigid, as though he had never met Dagny before. Dagny offers to slap Bertram Scudder. But Hank can’t keep his eyes off her bare shoulder.

Dagny overhears a conversation among some elderly people about their fear that the darkness will never leave. One old woman speaks about detonations heard out in Delaware Bay. The official explanation is Coast Guard target practice, but everyone knows it is the pirate Ragnar Danneskjøld evading the Coast Guard. Several European people’s states have put a price on his head, and he has captured a ship with relief supplies slated for the People’s State of France. His ship is better than any in the navy of the People’s State of England. The government has asked the newspapers to enforce a blackout on reporting about him. He was once a student at Patrick Henry University. (Major plot point!)

”Who is John Galt?” one asks, and Dagny walks away. But the old woman follows and tells Dagny of the legend of John Galt, a variant of the legend of Atlantis. Dagny doesn’t believe it, but Francisco says he does and tells Dagny the story is true. They spar, but when Francisco looks at Dagny and says, “What a waste,” Dagny walks away, realizing that Francisco has read her mind.

The last straw is when the radio comes on, and she hears Liddy’s bastardization of Halley’s Fourth Concerto. As she prepares to leave, she hears Lillian Rearden speaking disparagingly about the bracelet of Rearden Metal she is wearing. In a fury, Dagny offers to exchange her diamond bracelet for Lillian’s Rearden Metal bracelet. Lillian takes the offer, and Hank suddenly turns solicitous to his wife – and bitterly cold to Dagny.

Hank, in his wife’s bedroom, asks that she not invite these people again to the house.

The Purpose of This Chapter

We meet the friends of Philip and Lillian Rearden, a veritable rogues gallery of New York intellectuals; the overwhelming impression is one of uselessness and nihilism. Francisco is probing Hank, and Dagny’s relationship with Hank hits a bad spot. Something is going on, but it’s impossible to figure it out yet.

The New York Intellectuals

Intellectuals in general held differing but strong opinions of Ayn Rand.

• William F. Buckley: "Ayn Rand is dead. So, incidentally, is the philosophy she sought to launch; it was in fact stillborn."
• Noam Chomsky: “One of the most evil figures of modern intellectual history.”
• Chris Matthew Sciabarra: "The left was infuriated by her anti-communist, procapitalist politics, whereas the right was disgusted with her atheism and civil libertarianism."

After her Hollywood years, Rand came to New York and settled there for the rest of her long life. She had her own group of followers, whom she dubbed “The Collective” as a joke aimed at Marxism. Alan Greenspan was one of them.

Rand no doubt rubbed shoulders with New York’s intellectuals of the Left, and the dominant group at that time dubbed itself “The New York Intellectuals”. (How original!) This group defined itself as socialist and Marxist, but not pro-Soviet. They wrote for Partisan Review, Commentary and Dissent, any of which may be the real life version of Bertram Scudder’s The Future. (Today, one would point to magazines like Mother Jones or The Nation as candidates.)

The names of these intellectuals are a “Who’s Who” of that era, and some of them are still alive today. Among them were Lionel Trilling, Diana Trilling (his wife), Alfred Kazin, Delmore Schwartz, Harold Rosenberg, Dwight Macdonald, Mary McCarthy, Irving Howe, Saul Bellow, Daniel Bell, Hannah Arendt, Susan Sontag, Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz. Most of them were Jewish. Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz moved right in later years and formed the core of the neo-conservative movement. Proving that some people just live too long, Susan Sontag spent her last years as a relentless self-parody, finally skewered by Camille Paglia in a brilliant essay.

One enjoyable parlor game is to look at the rogues gallery of intellectuals at Hank Rearden’s party and guess whom they were based on.

• Balph Eubank, author, none of whose books has ever sold more than 3000 copies.
• Claude Slagenhop, president of Friends of Global Progress.
• Bertram Scudder, editor of The Future, whose speech contains the definitive manifesto, “Property rights are a superstition.”
• Mort Liddy, composer, whose film scores are kitsch classical and whose modern symphonies are unlistenable.
• Simon Pritchett, head of the Philosophy Department at Patrick Henry University and apparently the father of the modern philosophical school of Nihilism.

Typical of Rand, these characters drip banality and evil years before Hannah Arendt joined those words in her essay about Adolf Eichmann. More will join their ranks in future chapters.

Some Discussion Topics

1. For the past three years, Dr. Simon Pritchett has been the chair of the Philosophy Department of Patrick Henry University. How the mighty have fallen! Considering what Rand has said about that school, what does this tell us of the state of American higher education?
2. ”Good composers borrow, but great composers steal.” Today, John Williams is the film composer who steals brilliantly, mining the great European classical tradition. During the Fifties, Harvard professor Tom Lehrer performed a masterly comic bit about movies requiring a soundtrack that people could hum. (“The Ten Commandments, cha-cha-cha.”) Where does Mort Liddy fit in? How bad can his music be?
3. ”The black dress seemed excessively revealing – because it was astonishing to discover that the lines of her shoulder were fragile and beautiful, and that the diamond band on the wrist of her naked arm gave her the most feminine of all aspects: the look of being chained.” Where there are chains, can whips be far behind? Yet more sadomasochism? What insight does this give us into the author’s philosophy of sexuality? Did Ayn Rand like rough sex?
4. Balph Eubank’s comment about Dagny having babies strikes a false note. In the Fifties, such a view would have been considered normal, but not from a New York intellectual – except possibly Norman Mailer. Intellectuals of the Fifties were dismissive of the whole zeitgeist of that era when women were expected to cook, sew and have babies. So let’s take Eubank’s discordant note and analyze it. What is Rand trying to say here?
5. Eubank wants a government subsidy for the arts. Less than a decade after the book was published, Lyndon Johnson signed a law creating the National Endowment for the Arts, National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System. Have American art, radio and television improved since then? Has government involvement had a positive or negative effect? Why?
6. It’s time to increment the body count. Hugh Akston, former head of the Philosophy Department at Patrick Henry University, retired and disappeared nine years ago. That’s contemporaneous with Richard Halley.
7. How does one dare oppose the will of the majority? Contrast Dan Conway’s use of that question with Francisco’s.
8. What is going on with Hank and Dagny?
9. ”Who is John Galt?” This time it comes from an elderly lady, but she has some background information that sounds like the stuff of legend. Further, Francisco tells Dagny that the legend is true. Who is fooling whom?

Next Saturday: The Exploiters and the Exploited

[meowmeow]

Eubank wants a government subsidy for the arts. Less than a decade after the book was published, Lyndon Johnson signed a law creating the National Endowment for the Arts, National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System. Have American art, radio and television improved since then? Has government involvement had a positive or negative effect? Why?

Unfortunately for the artist, the ultimate patron of the arts is time. In the past, artists had to win patrons. There were some people who knew good stuff when they saw it and others who simply had money and no taste. Now I sit here listening to Mozart, next to a poster of my favorite Van Gogh painting because time kept their work alive. There were probably plenty of not-so-good artists who were popular in eras past, but not good enough to the long haul.

Government sponsorship of art has damaged good art because government has an agenda and everything must be filtered through it. 100 years from now, I can't imagine that anyone will spend a chilly afternoon listening to a symphony inspired by AIDS sufferers next to a poster of the piss Christ. But I bet ol' Mozart and VVG will still be around.

The product of industry has a much shorter path to success than art. A great product can make a near immediate impact on the world. And the government can screw that up just as quickly.

In this chapter, we end up just as baffled over Lillian as Hank was - what does she want? What is she after? I agree that she really does seem to hate her husband. Yet all these people at the party are mostly her friends and she is receiving attention and admiration from her most trendy group of guests.

[TASMANIANRED]

I have to admit this chapter was one of my least favorites..

I avoid people like the “party guests” like the plague.

I have to work with a few of them and have a few in my family.

I cannot hold my tongue do I do my level best to avoid hearing their conversation or engaging them.

If I hear someone spilling a load of BS I call it. I also don't have a problem saying “That's a lie’, or “you obviously don't have a clue what you are talking about”.

I'd probably be shunned if I cared enough to notice. I'm not exactly anti social but my social skills don't allow me to slide in b/s without commenting on it.

I suffered with Reardon as he went through this. I'd have been throwing people out of my house.

[Publius]

You sound a bit like Dagny. She was quite cheerful when she volunteered to slap Bertram Scudder.

[TASMANIANRED]

I’m about 10 inches too short.

[whodathunkit]

Judging by the way our country is headed, I think you and everyone of a like mind should call it like it is. Sure, you will p*** off a lot of people (I know I have), but you might be surprised at how many agree with you. Political Correctness is dead as far as I'm concerned.

I suffered with Reardon as he went through this. I'd have been throwing people out of my house.

If this group met at Rearden's Mill, I have no doubt that would have occurred. The house appears to be Lillian's. Rearden seem to want to keep his marriage intact but Lillian has done everything she could to make the evening uncomfortable.

[TASMANIANRED]

The house may be Lillians domicile and her roost to rule but it is Hanks house. He is footing the bills for Lillian and his family of parasites.

I can understand wanting to keep the peace in his marriage.

Hank is all confused emotionally. He has allowed himself to be brainwashed.

He is a willing host to a bunch of leeches.

Leeches can't suck you dry unless you let them.

One of the leftist phrases that I actually approve of is “speaking truth” to power but I call it “speaking truth is power”.

[whodathunkit]

Leeches can't suck you dry unless you let them.

This would have been an excellent working title for Atlas Shrugged!

[TASMANIANRED]

Thanks.

[rlmorel]

"...Leeches can't suck you dry unless you let them..."

Exquisite and to the point. May I honor your statement by using it as my tagline for a while?

[TASMANIANRED]

Sure.

[Jenny Hatch]

can you add me as well to this list?

Jenny

[mckenzie7]

Please add me also. I ordered my book from Amazon last week.

[Publius]

Ping to Post #2 that has all the links.

[Flamenco Lady]

I did a search on google for Ayn Rand a few weeks ago and there was one picture I remember seeing of her face when she was a young woman and I thought she was quite beautiful in it. Some women don’t age well and she didn’t fair very well in that regard.

[Tony in Hawaii]

I had jury duty today, so I dragged out my ancient paperback copy of Atlas Shrugged. I’m pretty much caught up with the group now.

Believe it or not, I have this copy because in 1980, I took an Econ 101 class at the University of Hawaii at Hilo, and AS was assigned by the professor. His class was my introduction to free market economics.

Boy, is that type small, though! I didn’t care when I was 19, but now at 47, I practically need a jeweler’s loupe to read it.

Please add me to the ping. Thanks!

[Real Cynic No More]

It's really amazing that Ms Rand could have been so prophetic. I read the book about 7 years ago and found its premise to be right on with the facts at that time, except that then the situations in the book were an exaggeration of the social and political climate. Now that I've been re-reading it, I never realized that we could have sunk so low that they're no longer exaggerated, but a quite accurate replication of reality today. And, the troubling thing is that it's quite likely to get worse before it gets better.

It's now time to increase the priority of bringing Atlas Shrugged to the big screen. In listening to Rush Limbaugh's diatribes, I think he is perfect to play the John Galt character.

I'd like to see a series of political cartoons illustrating how private businesses and entrepeneurs represent the engine of the economy (such as a train engine), with the engine pulling a few passenger cars partially filled with passengers as in a few years ago, and the times today showing thousands of individuals jumping onto the train and the engine bogging down because it can't support the load. Another, where it's a ferry boat, and thousands of individuals jumping onto the boat at the dock, causing it to sink.

That's what's really happening. In my opinion, those who don't acknowledge it are either really ignorant or they must have an agenda to actually make it happen.

Here's what Nikita Khrushchev said: I once said, "We will bury you," and I got into trouble with it. Of course we will not bury you with a shovel. Your own working class will bury you.

We're well on the way to fulfilling Khrushchev's prophecy.

[Hoodat]

So, why does Hank completely give Dagny the cold shoulder after the bracelet exchange? Does he realize that he is in love with her and must hide it at all costs? Or has he admitted it to himself?

Rearden considers himself to be guilt-ridden because of his commitment to Lillian, so it is a self-imposed torture that he is playing out. He is definitely in love with Dagny, but he has exiled himself because he continues to assume his place of guilt under the looters' standards.

[Mamzelle]

Please to ping. Read it years ago, loved it, still love it but find it overwrought at times.

Uneasy how she seems to be Obama's scriptwriter. It's like when he looks into the teleprompter he channels Wesley Mouch.

And even Rand couldn't come up with a Pelosi!

Her athiesm was very kneejerk...if she could have understood faith on some level, she would have been a better writer. You couldn't do a good satire of a Pelosi without some rudimentary Christianity to see what a true monster Pelosi is...

[r-q-tek86]

Part I, Chapter VII: The Exploiters and the Exploited

[betsyross60]

ping