Posted on 08/08/2009 7:34:27 AM PDT by Publius
Synopsis
Dagny tries to out-think a rather unintelligent guard who knows who she is, knows she is a friend of Head of State Thompson, but refuses to admit her to the Project F building because Dr. Ferris has ordered that no one be admitted. She trumps by pulling out a gun. The guard is caught between two masters, the Head of State and the Executive Director, and he can’t decide which one to follow. She puts him out of his misery by firing a bullet from the silenced gun into his heart.
Francisco, Hank and Ragnar Danneskjøld join her after killing one guard and binding and gagging three others. Francisco takes the key, unlocks the door and goes in alone. He is immediately challenged by two guards whom he engages in a battle of wits until one guard goes for his gun; Francisco blows it out of his hand. Dagny, Hank and Ragnar come down the stairs and bind and gag the wounded guard. The remaining guard gives Francisco the layout of the building, the number and location of guards, and the location of the prisoner. Dr. Ferris and his entourage have left the building.
Hank goes up the stairs and finds six guards playing poker and only two guarding the room containing the prisoner. Another battle of wits ensues as Hank tries to convince the chief guard and his men that their information is out of date; the prisoner is to be delivered to Hank immediately. The chief knows that the prisoner’s presence is a secret, thus the chief shouldn’t know anything about him; therefore, Hank has to be lying. He picks up the phone and finds that it is dead. Hank now orders him to deliver the prisoner, lest he be reported for insubordination. John Galt has joined the government, and the deserters are all returning. One guard is elated to hear this, but the chief shuts him up. Realizing his men are not going to back him up, the chief fires at Hank, hitting him in the shoulder. Francisco shoots the gun out of his hand. The chief tries to hold his team together, but several drop their guns and bolt, and the chief tries to kill one of them. Ragnar crashes through the window, and the guards drop their guns, except for one who kills the chief.
Francisco rousts the guard from the door to the room where Galt is being held, and they break down the door. Galt is pleased to see his troops and takes brandy and a cigarette; he is none the worse for wear. They dress him and walk to a field just off the Institute’s grounds where their plane has been hidden. With Ragnar at the controls, they take off while Francisco patches Hank’s wound.
As they fly over New York, they see a city in chaos as everybody seeks to escape at the same time. Then the lights of New York go out as the power dies. Their job is done. It’s the end – but it’s also the beginning.
Eddie Willers has fixed the problem in San Francisco, obtaining immunity for the railroad from three different factions in the civil war tearing California apart. Without warning, the eastbound Comet stops abruptly in the middle of the Arizona desert as the locomotive fails. Eddie queries the conductor, who says the engineer is looking into it. Eddie asks the fireman to contact division headquarters via phone box and get a mechanic sent to the train, but the division doesn’t answer. Eddie asks the conductor to check if there is an electrical engineer among the passengers. Then he goes to the locomotive cab to see if he can do anything to fix the problem, but this isn’t what he was trained for. The engineer is about to give up, and Eddie desperately tries not to.
To everyone’s shock, a train of covered wagons appears out of the night. It had left California’s Imperial Valley due to the civil war and the seizure of crops, and had headed east by night to avoid the government’s minions. The wagon master offers to take the train’s passengers on board for a fee and informs Eddie that the bridge over the Mississippi is gone. Eddie watches as the train’s passengers and crew leave the Comet for the wagon train. The engineer asks Eddie to come, but Eddie can’t. Thinking of Dagny, Eddie tries to start the locomotive but to no avail. Leaving the engine, he sits on the tracks, sobbing in the night.
At Galt’s Gulch, Richard Halley plays his Fifth Concerto, Midas Mulligan plots his future investments, Ragnar Dannkeskjøld reads Aristotle while wife Kay checks her stage makeup, Judge Narragansett rewrites the Constitution, and Francisco, Hank and Ellis Wyatt plan the future manufacturing of railroad locomotives using Galt’s motor. John and Dagny walk through the mountains as John decides it is time for him and his apostles to go back to the world. He makes the Sign of the Dollar in the air as a benediction.
The Cruel Kiss-Off of Eddie Willers
Hollywood treatments of Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame, from Lon Chaney to Disney, have always sugar-coated the story. In the book, Esmerelda is hanged, and the captain of the guard rides away, blissfully unaware. The hanging is botched, so two men grab Esmerelda’s legs to hasten her death. Quasimodo visits her body at the charnel house where it is deposited and dies there. Centuries later, their bones are found intermingled.
So it is with Rand and Eddie Willers. He held the railroad together and proved his management skills and his mettle. He kept things going while Dagny ran a project in Colorado, dropped out in the Berkshires, and then spent a month at Galt’s Gulch. He put up with brother Jim, which deserves a medal in itself. In military parlance, Eddie has “earned his stripes.” Various people at the railroad and Rearden Steel have been admitted to Valhalla over the years, and yet Eddie Willers is left sobbing on the tracks. John Galt could have wrecked Taggart Transcontinental early on by simply recruiting Eddie away from the railroad, but he needed Eddie as a spy. Eddie Willers has been badly used by the characters in the novel and by Rand herself.
Would it have been too much to have the plane drop down and rescue Eddie from the frozen train? Does Dagny even think of him? Could he be admitted to Galt’s Gulch? What does it take to get inside that valley? Will Eddie have a role in the reconstruction of the world?
The end of the novel leaves too many questions for comfort.
The Sign of the Dollar
Catholics and Orthodox Christians cross themselves at the beginning of prayer in a ritual known as the Sign of the Cross, dedicating their prayers to the three persons of God. The Cross is the preeminent symbol of all branches of Christianity.
So it is with Rand. The Sign of the Dollar appears on their cigarettes. It appears in solid gold at Galt’s Gulch. It is scrawled by guerilla warriors on government buildings as America frays and falls apart. At the very end, John Galt, as pope of the new religion of Objectivism, makes the Sign of the Dollar as a benediction as he prepares with his saints to return to earth in a second coming.
For an atheist, Rand is certainly layering on the religious symbolism.
Discussion Topic
Or, it could be that Ayn Rand was stuck with a character she really didn’t know what to do with at the end.
When Eddie went West, Dagny was still fighting, hoping to hold on. Dagny couldn’t go herself, so, it was logical to send Eddie. At this point, the plot pretty much demanded Eddie go.
But, Taggert bridge had to be blown up, so that Dagny would finally throw in the towel.
It’s almost like “oops, I’ve got Eddie on the wrong side of the Mississippi, now what do I do with him?”
Every author has passages and threads that turn into clunkers.
Why should Rand be any different?
Thanks much for all the hard work.
You’ve both guided some fascinating conversations with these threads.
Maybe it's not so implausible if we look at it from a different angle: Rather than people running off to a hideaway located somewhere else, maybe they could stay put and create a sort of underground economy.
That seems to be what today's criminals do. There's an underground economy all around us now with stores operating as fronts and so on.
Eddie died alone on the tracks, but wasn't granted the release that physical death would have provided. His sin, as stated, was that he lived for another man (woman/Dagny) not for himself.
Rand ruthlessly demonstrates what happens to followers when there is no one left to follow. He ended up as the dust within the hollow tree. I quote for reference...
"The great oak tree had stood on the hill over the Hudson, in a lonely spot on the Taggert estate. Eddie Willers, aged 7, liked to come and look at that tree. It had stood there hundreds of years, and he thought it would always stand there...
...He felt safe in the oak trees presence; it was a thing that nothing could change or threaten; it was his greatest symbol of strength.
One night, lightning struck the oak tree. Eddie saw it the next morning. It lay broken in half, and he looked into its trunk as into the mouth of a black tunnel. The trunk was only an empty shell; its heart had rotted away long ago; there was nothing inside - just a thin gray dust that was being dispersed by the whim of the faintest wind. The living power had gone, and the shape it left had not been able to stand without it."
Thank you both! I joined the party late, but it has been wonderful. :)
Taxman Bravo Zulu!
I have thoroughly enjoyed your hard work and dedication, and now have a more complete understanding of this complex and fascinating novel/philosophy.
Thank you very much!
I look forward to the next FReeper book club exercise
And lovely chapter it was. The scene with Dagny and the guard could almost have been a Monty Python skit, and likewise much of what followed on the way to the rescue of Galt. So paraphrasing the famous line, ‘tis but a scratch’, had me laughing for a good bit.
But the main thing is Galt was rescued with help from Batman himself, and finally allowed to put on some clothes.
But what becomes of the world now? And whither Eddie Willers, in particular?
These few (maybe a couple hundred in the gulch?) are not going to go out on the cleared road and rebuild the surviving society into their ideal. Not without a great deal of difficulty, and perhaps not in their lifetimes.
It is a lovely fantasy though, and one many of us would love to play out - to a point at least. In my alternate version we would gather our gold, move the gulch, and stay. To hell with the looters and the rest of society. After all, we pledged to not live for the sake of others, right?
And Eddie? With the train to himself, he no doubt has several days food and water on board, and likely some cigarettes and quite a lot of booze. Used with care, it's enough to get him to the next town, where he'll find someone for whom to live, and he'll be fine.
I didn’t care for the fate of Eddie Willers, either. Eddie’s character is almost a caricature throughout the book. I sometimes wondered if he was really a Golden Retriever. The director’s assistant is an ambitious and energetic person. In Rand’s day, such a person would almost certainly sidestep a woman who was in his way. He would also be privy to numerous insider transactions, which would be perfectly legal at the time. He would have been paid well and he would have the oportunity to trade stocks and make himself very wealthy. He kisses James Taggart’s ass for years, which would foster murderous resentment in any normal person, such as readers of the book. But all he can think of is getting the train to run, even though he knows there is no place for it to go.
But he was there to make a point. No matter how nice you are, no matter how much you produce, no matter how everyone likes you, if you let them use you, you will only get used. He wasn’t recruited for Galt’s Gulch, also known as the collection of lovers of Dagny Taggart. And here is an interesting point. Eddie was in love with Dagny since they were little kids, before even Francisco D’Anconia was introduced in the book. But he never acted on it. At some point near the end, he tells her how he really feels. Her response is essentially, “I knew that.”
Eddie appears to be single throughout the whole story. He hid his love for Dagny Taggart the entire time, never accepted the fact that he couldn’t have her and never moved on. Sorry, Eddie. The world is a bad place for nice guys.
As for the fight scene, I can only guess that Rand felt that since she had a pirate running loose during most of the story, at some point he should do something piratical. Calling it inappropriate would be kind. Regarding the rest of the entry into Project F, it had 16 guards according to the opening scene. This is a reasonable number given the time. Four of them are down before they even get inside. Is it unreasonable for Dagny Taggart to kill the guard at the door? Galt is inside. His captors are torturing him, possibly killing him. What was unreasonable to me is that she wasted her time talking to the guy. Rand demonstrates a typical fictional gunfight. Lots of talk and very little cover or center of mass. If you think that was bad, recall the first Charlie’s Angels movie. The fight scene in that one was so stupid it was hard to beleive they filmed it. Perhaps Ms. Barrymore threatened to cut off the producer’s coc supply if he didn’t do it her way.
How do they know when to go back? When Dagny tells them she will not stay in Galt’s Gulch, Galt reveals a few details about what will happen to the cities when society breaks down., The last thing on his list is the loss of electric power for light. I found it out of character that Galt wouldn’t want Dagny to look at New York in the darkness. She helped make it happen, in more than one way.
What happens next? The sequel would have been an interesting tale. They’ve created an anarchy. There is no law but force and no reason for anyone to trade. Armed gangs would rule, at least until someone organizes Judge Naragansett’s idea of a business friendly society. That would not be easy. Such a society would be fragmented at best. It would consist of small groups who banded together for whatever benefit they might derive from each other. Those willing to use force would dominate. Pacifists wouldn’t last very long. Neither would the weak. Such a place would require a strong leader. That leader would have to push change very hard, and probably force it on some. Rand’s ethics would eventually take, but in the beginning trade would take a backseat to survival.
You have just described the Dark Ages.
Several things. I think sig's description of what is likely to happen after Atlas finishes shrugging is probably pretty accurate. When larger societies fail, smaller ones crop up within, generally organized around the clan/tribe structure that seems written into the human genome. Within these prototypical organizations - Marx was definitely wrong about this and so, I think, was Rand - economics takes on a form that does not require a great deal of formal exchange, nor is it socialistic in nature, each contributing to the whole selflessly. It is what it is, and we see it in every society that goes through this sort of breakdown.
The Western Roman Empire, for example, shrank into the little puddles before its fall (Rand's metaphor for electricity here is exact) centered around self-sufficient manors, from which manorial barons slowly coalesced into other forms of meta-organization. This process had been in place for quite some time before the Merovingians came along to try to link the puddles once more.
It is only then that real commerce follows much more than a glorified barter system. Recall Rand's description of the desperate men mining coal by night and selling it on the black market. The ethical system is Galt's - she described it as "the ruthless observance of one's given word," but it is not industrial-age economics, with contracts and legal protection. That has to wait for industry itself.
And incidentally, how in the world are such contracts to be enforced if Judge Narragansett's "Congress shall make no laws regarding production and trade" becomes the law? I'd love to see a discussion around that one.
Now, as to Eddie Willers. We recall that upon Dagny's return subsequent to the tunnel disaster, she wastes no time in sketching out a plan to re-establish the transcontinental routes. But for a change she isn't the one top-kicking the thing along as she did with the John Galt Line. Eddie does that. And the real problem with Eddie Willers is that he can't do that and still end up a beaten lap-dog. Doesn't compute. He can either be the one or the other, but both requires some sort of character flaw that Rand never presented.
It's a real problem. I cribbed this interview from the Objectivist website, with none other than Rand's acolyte and one-time lover Nathaniel Branden:
Questions and Answers: 7 June 1998
Holly Davis asks: In Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged Eddie Willers is presented as a thoroughly moral and admirable person. Yet he is not invited into Galt’s Gulch. Did Ms. Rand ever discuss her reasons for this or for why Eddie’s life ends in tragedy?
Nathaniel Branden responds: Yes, she did. Or rather, I heard her answer questions of this kind any number of times.
Galt’s Gulch is a place where the Prime Movers of society are invited to, when they go on strike. It is not a place where any moral man or woman would be invited to merely because of being “a good person.” In that sense, it is an elite society—“the aristocracy of superior ability.” Therefore, do not view it as a literal prototype of an ideal society in the real world; it is not meant to be that.
Eddie’s end is meant to show what happens to “the best of the average” when the Dagnys and Reardens are gone from the world, and the James Taggarts are in control. Eddie, Ms. Rand would say, is too honest to survive in James Taggart’s world when “the better people” are gone.
To add my own viewpoint, I find Eddie’s end somewhat troublesome. “The best of the average” is a little tougher and more independent than Eddie is presented as being. He could be a leader in his own right and on his own level, even if not on that of the book’s heroes. I would like to have seen that shown. He should not have stayed with the train. He should have made his first priority to survive. That he chose the end he chose was not, as I see it, “idealism,” but an unfortunate expression of immaturity, dependency, and lack of realism: he could not absorb that the world of his youth was gone—and that the battle for a better world had to be fought from scratch. For these reasons, incidentally, it was not entirely plausible that he be Dagny’s “right-hand man.” That job would have called for a person of better mind and greater autonomy.
While I cannot say I agree with all of Branden's interpretation he does raise a couple of valid points. But if we open the focus of the question from Eddie's character to Dagny's as well we do see something disturbing, and that is simply that she did not treat her subordinates - plural, Eddie isn't the only one who fought to the last - in the same manner that Rearden, Francisco, and Danneskjold treated theirs. Theirs did end up in Galt's Gulch. So much, I think, for the postulation that the Gulch was only for the elite of the elite. It wasn't. And by those standards Eddie does belong.
As for what happens next, well, unfortunately industrial societies of this size and complexity tend to produce a surplus that keeps the looters in business for a remarkable amount of time after the production ceases. One needn't be an inventor like Galt to produce motors if one has technical manuals, workers, and determination. It can be done perfectly well under a police state and it was. Such a state cannot compete with free enterprise in terms of production and advancement of technology but it can certainly put out motors. We're not talking about Atlas now but another of Rand's metaphors, Prometheus. Like Rand's Prometheus, the fire has been given and cannot be taken back. (Unlike Rand's Prometheus, the real one wasn't punished by men for benefiting them but by the gods, but I suppose we shoudn't complain too much if she takes a little pencil to Greek mythology; Lord knows the Greeks did).
In any case, post-Shrug America will likely run down but not stop, and will only come onto the Galtean system reluctantly as its own prison-farm industries are out-competed by the Gulchers. And at some point the Gulchers are going to have to come up with a Project X of their own, because the bad guys will be. Prison states do tend to be rather good at that sort of thing. Sooner or later the North Koreans will accomplish in decades what the Manhattan Project did in weeks, but accomplish it they will. Just my $0.02.
Ugh - “shoudn’t” => “shouldn’t”. I blame the capitalists for stealing one of the people’s “l”s...
OK, I'll give it a try.
It appears that the learned Judge is proposing a new addition to the Bill of Rights, but even as the current Rights are open to interpretation, and are not absolute, this one in his stated form would have difficulty flying. And it on its face seems even more absolute and unarguable than the Second Amendment is (what part of "...shall not be infringed..." don't they understand?).
I suggest that what the Judge really wants is to keep government out of trade and commerce BEFORE the fact, so that parties could legally contract to do whatever they wished, as long as both parties were in agreement, and no laws designed to protect outside parties were broken. A lot like the current situation, except that government is far too proactive in defining harm to third parties.
Examples:
Current law in most states prohibits me from hiring out as prostitute (presuming I wanted to. Hey, the money is good, and chances are you'll get to meet a lot of Congresspersons). But Lance Armstrong can hire out his body to the benefit of Team Astana and Alberto Contador for more money than I could get. Why? Harm to the "public good", in my case, even though it would be hard to demonstrate such harm.
I can't sell my extra kidney to Greg Lemond, in case the only one he has fails (which it might have done when he got shot close to it while hunting. Yet the hospital, the doctors and nurses, and the broker of the deal would all expect to be paid, and rightly so.
I think the problem is similar to that with the Commerce Clause; the purpose behind it was not included in the Clause, so that what was intended to prevent trade wars between the sovereign states has been interpreted to authorize Congress to interfere with anything they want, as long as they can somehow hang on it the possibility that there might be something involved in the transaction at some point crossing state lines. Clearly, at least to me, not what was intended. So the Judge needs to clarify his intentions, and put them in the Amendment.
K
Today she could get $4500 for that clunker...
That’s pretty much what I was thinking as a model, but the dark ages would be a very nice time compared to what we would get if this happened now. Things like mustard gas and people like Dr. Mengele can’t be erased from the record. Things like antibiotics and sterile IV fluids can’t be obtained without sophisticated production and distribution methods.
Those people who’ve expressed a desire for the world of Atlas Shrugged should really contemplate what their lives would be like without all the stuff that modern life assumes. Their lives would be, in a word, short.
When I first read AS, the last chapter so enraged me I wanted to throw the book out the window in disgust, despite how much I found the concepts fascinating. I didn’t give Eddie much thought. But reading everyone else’s comments made me think about him some more. To me he represented the sincerely deluded. He kept working so hard to keep up the railroad, he really was working to keep the looters in business. Now while Dagney does this too, she is by nature a leader. Eddie by nature is a follower. Galt recruits Dagney and not Eddie because of this.
I see in Eddie the would be shrugger who just can’t quit, because he feels he has too much of himself invested in his enterprise to give it up. It is a hard thing to do to sacrifice something you have worked hard to build up. It is a hard thing to do leave your customers, clients and family hanging. In the end it is the reason why most producers will keep on plodding through and the looters taking what they can.
Without the complete collapse of production, there will always be enough loot to motivate the Looters. Their ranks will rise and fall but never completely disappear.
Einstein once was asked 'what is the most powerful force in the universe?' He responded "compound interest." It is my contention that technology, like interest, can be compounded. Some of today's social problems are a reflection of the devaluation of goods and services made possible by this 'compound technology'. (consider the computer in front of you!) This surplus of goods and services need to be consumed to maintain demand. If technology were to stagnate, e.g. 10-289, the surplus would eventually be consumed and the value of goods and services would increase, consumption would necessarily decrease.
If technology is able to advance at a compounded rate sans 10-289, with the byproduct being a glut in goods and services, how will our world look in the future?
The limiting factors will be the availability of raw materials and energy. Technological advances would be meaningless without either.
Agreeing with your contention that a surplus benefits the Looters, and I think that we agree that technology produces surplus, how can we embrace technological advances without benefiting the Looters?
In any case, post-Shrug America will likely run down but not stop, and will only come onto the Galtean system reluctantly as its own prison-farm industries are out-competed by the Gulchers.
There will not be a defining day that we all shrug but I think you are on to something with providing a choice between "prison-farm industries" and "Gulching". The thirteenth amendment guarantees our freedom from slavery and involuntary servitude. We, being a free people, have the choice between these systems. Those who fail to fully understand, by signing on a dotted line, are going to be enslaved by 'voluntary servitude' selling their lives cheaply.
For those who do understand what freedom from slavery and involuntary servitude means, they will exercise that right demonstrating to others what it means to live free. Excessive taxes and enslaving credit must be shunned at every opportunity. Both are claims on your life by others.
Good catch. I hadn't picked up on the tree being an analogy for Eddie's life in particular. But, that one line does make it clear. In the end, that's exactly what happens to Eddie.
So what happened, from the AS point of view? It was (and remains) an agricultural economy in the beginning stages of full industrialization. And just as we are discussing above, its producers were successively taxed into penury, their product confiscated, and finally dispossessed of their means of production altogether. Those who were given the latter were so on the basis of political pull in the firm belief that the production was a matter of magic and that anyone could do as well as the "thieves" who had built the system. Were Hank Rearden a Rhodesian farmer the salient issues of Atlas Shrugged would hardly need altering at all.
And the surplus finally did run out. What we saw, in addition, was the devolution of society into the village/clan model (made far more vicious by militant politics), the emergence of a black market and a barter economy, and the crippling of progress by the determination of the ruling class that any profit from the expansion of infrastructure be relegated to its members. The result is total paralysis. And the last to suffer are the members of the ruling class, who maintain themselves by a monopoly on violence.
That's how it happens in the real world. The struggles described in Atlas Shrugged seem almost antiseptic by comparison.
At the end of the story, I didn’t envision Eddie eventually being rescued by Dagny and gang, either. That interview with Branden seals it. But, yes, come to think of it, the story of Eddie does seem to be lacking. His end seems to be there to serve only as a warning. All the characters of AS seem a bit too contrived, but so were the characters in movies at the time. The point of the story is what’s real. We’re living through the point now, it seems.
The left tried to save their collectivist dystopias by blaming its inherent faults on particular persons. Kruschev tried to defend the purity of communism by blaming its atrocities on Stalin and the "cult of personality".
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