Wealthcare: Ayn Rand's Retardation. Damn you Spelling Nazis!

[Caliga]

Really?

Yeah.  The only plays I could understand were The Tempest and The Merchant of Venice.  With Hamlet, I had to read verses over and over again to even get a basic idea of what was going on, and I eventually just gave up trying to read it.  Same deal with A Midsummer Night's Dream. 

[Syt]

I find Shakespeare's writing impossible to understand. 

Oddly, I find that overall he's easier (though far from completely intelligeable, especially his sonnets) for me in the English original than the 18th century German translation that was the standard during my school time.

[Eddie Teach]

I enjoy a good Rand/Libertarian bashing thread.

On a forum owned by a "rabid libertarian" no less.

[Caliga]

There are no "rabid" libertarians here.

[Sheilbh]

Oddly, I find that overall he's easier (though far from completely intelligeable, especially his sonnets) for me in the English original than the 18th century German translation that was the standard during my school time.

The sonnets and Hamlet are just very difficult.  I find that really interesting though.  What is it about the 18th century German that's so frustrating?

[Syt]

Oddly, I find that overall he's easier (though far from completely intelligeable, especially his sonnets) for me in the English original than the 18th century German translation that was the standard during my school time.

The sonnets and Hamlet are just very difficult.  I find that really interesting though.  What is it about the 18th century German that's so frustrating?

Vocabulary/grammar is somewhat different and outdated. There's been new attempts at translating the classics (same with Russian 19th century authros) into a more modern language while remaining adequate (i.e. trying to keep connotations etc. as best possible intact).

In English the vocabulary doesn't seem to have changed so much, and if grammar/syntax was different back then it was (or at least feels to me) closer yet to German.

[Jacob]

That's actually not her position.  In The Fountainhead Howard Roark is shown to be a man who works his ass off to the exclusion of almost all else.  She values hard work a great deal.

That's not what I meant when I said "workers" and you know it.

[Berkut]

Her idea of enterpeneur as hero (at least as it is presented in Atlas Shrugged) was taken from Victor Hugo.  She even includes the same sort of epilogue about factories collapsing without their great leader that Hugo uses in Les Miserable.

I thought Hugo was a fair bit more sympathetic to the workers and his point is that factory bosses owe a duty of care towards their workers, something which seems to be the antithesis of Rand's fuck the workers position.

You've never actualy read any Rand, have you?

The idea that she has a "fuck the workers" position is simply...ignorant.

[Syt]

The idea that she has a "fuck the workers" position is simply...ignorant.

You mean having carnal knowledge of of a member of the proletariat would be beneath her standing?

[Caliga]

That's actually not her position.  In The Fountainhead Howard Roark is shown to be a man who works his ass off to the exclusion of almost all else.  She values hard work a great deal.

That's not what I meant when I said "workers" and you know it.

I honestly didn't know what you meant.  Do you mean that she doesn't value unskilled workers?  The poor?  Rand is no doubt an elitist and an unapologetic one, if that's what you're getting at.

Really, I think it's okay to like her books and not be some sort of card-carrying Objectivist, kind of like how people can enjoy studying the Bible and not be Christians.

[Jaron]

Aynrand was Berkuts hunter on Dalaran.

[Savonarola]

Her timing was perfect: the industry was booming, and she happened to have a chance encounter with the director Cecil B. DeMille--who, amazingly, gave a script-reading job to the young immigrant who had not yet quite mastered the English language.

That would go a long way towards explaining "Madam Satan."

Seriously, though, Rand had worked as a cast extra and in the wardrobe for years before being a script reader for DeMille.  Her first role as an extra was, amusingly enough, in King of Kings.

[Jacob]

You've never actualy read any Rand, have you?

The idea that she has a "fuck the workers" position is simply...ignorant.

Yeah, I have actually... I even went through a 15 minute phase where I thought she had a point.  Though it was a long time ago.

However, I am willing to defer to your more recent and probably more careful reading if you'd like.  What would you say are the salient points of Rand's thoughts?

[The Brain]

I find Shakespeare's writing impossible to understand. 

You, Sir, are a moron.

[Berkut]

You've never actualy read any Rand, have you?

The idea that she has a "fuck the workers" position is simply...ignorant.

Yeah, I have actually... I even went through a 15 minute phase where I thought she had a point.  Though it was a long time ago.

However, I am willing to defer to your more recent and probably more careful reading if you'd like.  What would you say are the salient points of Rand's thoughts?

Why ask me? I am sure you can find any number of decent summations of her philosophy out there that will be vastly superior to anything I can give you.