Ayn Rand Anthem Paper :: essays papers

Ayn Rand Anthem Paper When born into the world, you are sheltered and nourished. When the appropriate age is reached you begin your schooling. Once your education is hit you are employed and work with complete security in your trade. At forty years of age you retire and spend the rest of your days with your peers, with everything pass provided for you. That is as long as you learn at the same pace as everyone else. If youre too bright you will be punished. And as long as you dont ask too many questions, the overly inquisitive are beaten. As long as you dont care who you are told to sleep with, because we know who your genes are well-nigh compatible with. And as long as you dont believe you are any different or any better than anyone else is, because that will cost you your life. You arent granted a name or an identity or a soul. There are no individuals there is only the collective. This is the world of Anthem. Ayn Rand composes Anthem in an almost melodic fashion and the majority of the text embraces poetry more faithfully than it does prose. This does little to affect the storytelling, but it encourages the reader to view the novella as an extended song which detracts from the seriousness of the piece. Rand presents her tale of a man who dares to make individual choices, to seek knowledge in a dark age, to love the woman of his choice. In a society in which people have no names, no independence, and no values, he is hunted for the unpardonable crime having the courage to stand above the crowd.Rands own beliefs and her philosophy are most obviously seen through the protagonist, Equalitys, struggles. By having us bear witness to this oppression, her opinion on the detrimental effects of collectivism is communicate to us. The world described in Anthem is a primitive one, although it is set in the future. All technological development has been lost, because What is not done collectively cannot be good, and, What is not thought by every me n cannot be true. (p.81) In this collectivist society, the individual has been lost to assimilation, and all creativity is suppressed. In spite of all of this, Equality has always been different in the world in which he lives, this is a terrible sin.