Ayn Rand Centenary

February 2nd, 2005 | by Brian |

To observe the 100th Anniversary of Ayn Rand’s birth, Alex and I attended a lecture by John Stossel at the University of Denver. Stossel is a hero of mine that I have now met. And he signed a poster I helped design for a Campus Libertarians event a few years ago.

Even better, he wanted a copy of the poster, so I was glad to have brought a few. Ari Armstrong of the Colorado Freedom Report reported on this event, and included a photo of Stossel sigining the poster! Thanks, Ari!

Ayn Rand has probably influenced my thinking, values, ideals, and life more than any other author. I read The Fountainhead during the summer of 1991, and it just woke me up to what’s important to me, my values, and priorities in life, etc. Some good links are:
1. The Literary Achievement of The Fountainhead
2. Excerpt from The Fountainhead: Roark’s Courtroom speech
3. Excerpt from The Fountainhead: Rand’s description of Howard Roark’s Monadnock Valley development.. For me, this passage is quite powerful, as are the few other ones where Roark meets Stephen Mallory and Henry Cameron. Just thinking about it activates me, and this is why I wanted to call this block “Mondanock,” but the blogspot.com domain name was was already taken.
4. The ethics section of my political links.
5. Ayn Rand’s Contribution to the Cause of Freedom, by Roderick T. Long, a philosophy professor whose work I respect. This article has good links, though perhaps written for those already in the know.