The Ayn Rand Institute reports that Penguin USA has shipped more than 300,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged to bookstores, distributors, chains, online resellers, libraries, businesses and other institutions in the first half of 2009.
Compare that number to the first half of 2008: Penguin shipped 85,000 copies. According to the institute, 7 million copies of the book have sold since it was published in 1957, many of those by high school or college kids, I'm sure, who had little interest in Rand's philosophy.
What could have happened in a year to spark such interest? The folks at the Rand Institute seem to believe it's the book itself that is luring readers. But those of us with DVD players know better. It's Mad Men. Specifically, Mad Men on DVD.
The AMC series about the heady days of advertising - you know, when you could chainsmoke and drink at work and treat the secretaries as a sort of sexual smorgasbord - mentions Rand and/or Atlas Shrugged quite a few times, as Don Draper's boss likes to remind him he's Rand's ideal man every now and again.
This, by the way, is Don Draper (with his lovely wife Betty):
See what I mean? I'm not so sure it's Rand's theory of objectivism that's drawing people.
Really? I thought it was the Glenn Becks and all the taxed enough already loonies. Shows you how academically outdated America's conservative movement is.
Posted by: Andy | July 13, 2009 at 03:23 PM
According to the head of the Ayn Rand institute in a Wall Street Journal opinion column:
"Pundits including Rush Limbaugh and Rick Santelli urge listeners to read her books, and her magnum opus, "Atlas Shrugged," is selling at a faster rate today than at any time during its 51-year history.
There's a reason. In "Atlas," Rand tells the story of the U.S. economy crumbling under the weight of crushing government interventions and regulations. Meanwhile, blaming greed and the free market, Washington responds with more controls that only deepen the crisis. Sound familiar?"
Posted by: Silvia C | July 13, 2009 at 03:23 PM
Exactly--the loonies.
Posted by: Andy | July 13, 2009 at 03:52 PM
Rand's books have misled more young minds than I can comprehend. What a waste of intellectual potential!
Posted by: John Hopkins | July 14, 2009 at 10:52 AM
Repackaged Fascism.
Posted by: patrick | July 14, 2009 at 12:50 PM
Fascism is a polite word for what that is--Utopian Anarchism more like it.
Posted by: Andy | July 14, 2009 at 04:15 PM