Part One, Chapters I–II (1 - 2)

[Chris OConnor]

Part One, Chapters I–II (1 - 2)

Please use this thread for discussing the above chapters. You're welcome to create your own threads too.

[LanDroid]

Just a few random notes on Chapter 1, The Theme.

* I read the large calendar "saying in immovable finality: September 2" this morning, which is September 2. A bit a Jungian Synchronicity?
* A massive oak tree, seemingly capable of moving the Earth if pulled by the hand of God, is exposed by lightning as an empty shell. I expect that image to return.
* Ellis Wyatt finding oil in old fields with new technology has a parallel in fracking?
* The weakness of James Taggart: "We can't be blamed if our suppliers don't perform or the competition is unfair."
* James says several times to his sister Dagny "You have no sense of the human element at all." She admits, "No. I haven't."

Sorry, but I said they're just random notes...

On Edit:
AHA! I found the significance of September 2:
http://fawstin.blogspot.com/search?upda ... results=15

[lindad_amato]

I thought the same thing as I also started reading today. The friction between Dagny and her brother, and her strong character is established immediately. Also, the ingenuity that Rand so admired is shone in Wyatt.

[LanDroid]

In addition to the memory of the oak tree, Eddie Willers notices images of decay during his walk to the Taggart Transcontinental building.

The clouds and the shafts of skyscrapers against them were turning brown, like an old painting in oil, the color of a fading masterpiece. Long streaks of grime ran from under the pinnacles down the slender, soot-eaten walls. High on the side of a tower there was a crack in the shape of a motionless lightning, the length of ten stories. A jagged object cut the sky above the roofs; it was half a spire, still holding the glow of the sunset; the gold leaf had long since peeled off the other half. The glow was red and still, like the reflection of a fire: not an active fire, but a dying one which it is too late to stop.

...and somewhere within him, a drop of pain moving briefly and vanishing, like a raindrop on the glass of a window, its course in the shape of a question mark.

I don't know if these images are in the realm of Steinbeck (or whatever the literary standard is these days), but I think they're pretty good. I suspect they refer to the city, to Taggart Transcontinental, and to America. That level of creativity should help us slog through 1K pages of Rand philosophy. Agree?

[lindad_amato]

"That level of creativity should help us slog through 1K pages of Rand philosophy. Agree?"

Definitely, LanDroid. Rand's prose is more enjoyable than her philosophy, for me anyway. The quotes you posted are beautiful and, if I remember correctly, do continue through the book.

[Robert Tulip]

I can tell I am going to love this book. The way Dagny Taggart kicks ass is impressive. She is no nonsense, a real capitalist, straight to the point, not diverted by crap. Railways are about steel and money, not friendship. Ayn Rand chisels out her characters as stereotypes. Here is a classic exchange: James Taggart says to her when she has humiliated him for his incompetence

“Other people are human. They're sensitive. They can't devote their whole life to metals and engines. You're lucky—you've never had any feelings. You've never felt anything at all." As she looked at him, her dark gray eyes went slowly from astonishment to stillness, then to a strange expression that resembled a look of weariness, except that it seemed to reflect much more than the endurance of this one moment.

What is the ‘much more”? It is about resolve, confidence, ambition, integrity and vision. Also contempt for James. She is thinking that’s no way to run a railroad.

[lindad_amato]

What is the much more? Well, for one thing she's been putting up with James her whole life, but I think Rand meant to show Dagny's burden of having to put up with people who don't see the world as she does.

[LanDroid]

Chapter II The Chain

This chapter is mainly geared towards showing similarities between Hank Reardon and Dagny Taggart. For example Hank "had no capacity for the sort of conversations which were not supposed to be meant, so he did not answer." Here's another:

He saw an evening when he sat slumped across his desk in that office. It was late and his staff had left; so he could lie there alone, unwitnessed. He was tired. It was as if he had run a race against his own body, and all the exhaustion of years, which he had refused to acknowledge, had caught him at once and flattened him against the desk top. He felt nothing, except the desire not to move. He did not have the strength to feel—not even to suffer. He had burned everything there was to burn within him; he had scattered so many sparks to start so many things— and he wondered whether someone could give him now the spark he needed, now when he felt unable ever to rise again. He asked himself who had started him and kept him going. Then he raised his head. Slowly, with the greatest effort of his life, he made his body rise until he was able to sit upright with only one hand pressed to the desk and a trembling arm to support him. He never asked that question again.

What other similarities can you find between Hank and Dagny?

[LanDroid]

Reardon "knew that it was necessary to have a man to protect him from the legislature; all industrialists had to employ such men." I don't recall lobbying described in quite that way before. :axe: Later on the lobbyist is described as being successful at gaining benefits from the legislature, so OoooOops the truth slips out. :matx4:

Reardon's relationship with his family is terrible. His mother describes him as a spoiled brat and there are other indignities. In return, Hank "felt nothing for them now, nothing but the merciless zero of indifference, not even the regret of a loss."

In contrast, Phil Larkin's "motive in the relationship seemed to resemble the need of an anemic person who receives a kind of living transfusion from the mere sight of a savagely overabundant vitality." So Hank is both an overworked bore and a savagely overabundant vitality? Hmmmm, I need help to work that one out...

An unusual feature of Rand's philosophy is a contempt for altruism. Phil Larkin says,

"But that money is not for me. I am not collecting it for any personal motive. I have no selfish interest in the matter whatever." His voice was cold, with a note of self-conscious virtue.

Rearden turned away. He felt a sudden loathing: not because the words were hypocrisy, but because they were true; Philip meant them.

The symbol of The Chain is very well done. I'm sure Rand will explore/explain it further...

[sal10e]

This is my first time reading this novel and my first time reading any of Ayn Rand's fiction. I just finished reading these two chapters and really enjoyed Rand's imagery as well. LanDroid already mentioned the oak tree and I would add to that the map of the Transcontinental railway as a system of blood vessels and covering the map was also very dramatic and makes me think that these images will be important throughout the book. I also wonder if Rearden will regret making the donation in cash instead of by check. Rand's characterization of the brother and his charitable society as willing to take the money but not wanting to admit who it is from showed the hypocrisy of many organizations and Rand's thoughts on them. I found it interesting that Reardon gives the money to his brother with the thought that it will make him happy to have reached his fundraising goal but the brother shows no emotion and doesn't even seem to care.

I also like that Rand leaves little mysteries throughout the storty so far. Of course, there is "Who is John Galt?" and then why does Owen Kellogg quit and the question of Halley's Fifth Concerto. These seem to be little side stories that I'm assuming Rand will bring together as the novel progresses.

As for thoughts on how Reardon and Dagny Taggert are similar I found it interesting that both of their families dislike their focus on making money and running a business but are more than ok living off of them and not working while denigrating them at the same time. Both are very focused on business (of course) and are annoyed and frustrated that their are not more people around them, like themselves.