Our ongoing series reviewing audio adaptations of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror works. Note that these reviews may contain spoilers.
By John J. Joex
Book Rating: 1 out of 5 Stars
Audio Book Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars
Continuing my recent survey of dystopian novels (Nineteen Eight-Four, Brave New World, A Clockwork Orange), I thought I would go ahead and give a nod to Atlas Shrugged which I encountered on audio book last year. This one is often lumped amongst Science Fiction/Dystopian literature even though it is essentially author Ayn Rand’s monograph expounding on the Objectivist philosophy that she pioneered. Coming out in 1957, the novel looked at a future world (no specific date given) when socialist and labor interests have brought progress to a standstill in the United States and has the country on the brink of collapse. The book focuses on its female protagonist, Dagny Taggart, who takes control of the Taggart Transcontinental railroad company that her grandfather started (railroad is still king in this future) and tries to keep it running and productive despite interference from the government and unions. She finds herself thwarted at every turn, though, and also finds herself drawn into joining a group of industrialists and innovators who have removed themselves from a country that has begun to decay because of its heavily socialist mindset.
I first encountered Objectivism in comics books through the works of legendary artist Steve Ditko who became enamored with the philosophy in the 60’s and began to work it into the comic book stories he produced from that time forward. It crept into some of the Spider-Man stories that he did before leaving Marvel then became more prominent in some of the works that he did for Charlton like The Blue Beatle and The Question. Then even later he produced all-out Objectivist treatises in works like Mr. A and The Avenging World and much of serious work he did from the late 70’s and on. So when I stumbled across Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, considered the magnus opus for the philosophy, in audio book format I thought I would check it out, even though Ditko had never quite won me over to this line of thinking.
And I can’t say that I recommend Atlas Shrugged, either as a novel or as any sort of revelatory work of literature. As a novel, this book fails because the author seemed to have little interest in telling an interesting, thought-provoking story, only in preaching her philosophy to those willing to listen. There is little in the way of character or story development, and the dialogue often delivers long, stilted philosophical discourses that quickly bore anybody with no academic interest in the subject. And as any sort of philosophical statement, Atlas Shrugs fails because it’s far too one-sided. You can sum up its point pretty simply as “innovative, industrialists plus free market economy equals good, and backwards thinking socialists and labor unions supporting a welfare state equals bad.” But the book fails to invite discussion like other speculative fiction works or to really present strong arguments to either side, instead adopting a simplistic Goofus and Gallant approach. Rand suggests that the innovative actions of industrialists such as Dagny Taggart are necessary to keep the world and the economy moving forward, but ignores that their advancements often come on the backs of the laborers who must put them into motion. And it also ignores that the very free market economy that it props up did nothing to elevate the status of women at the time that the novel came out or even in the years that followed, making it unlikely that Dagny could ever rise to the position she held in Rand’s future world (apart from the nepotism that apparently aided her). Government interference (as obtrusive as it may have been) was what prodded the free market world into elevating women and non-whites beyond the non-servile positions that had been relegated to for so long. But don’t take my comments as any defense of socialist ideals, there’s plenty of faults to find on both sides, Rand just refuses to acknowledge any faults with her side of the story making this pretty much a one-dimensional diatribe against socialist ideals and in support of her capitalist Utopia.
For this reason, the novel also fails as a work of dystopian literature. Even though other dystopian works like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World suffered from a lack of focus on the characters and story and from a heavy input of the author’s own philosophy, that book still had some bite to its satire and made the reader think about some of its chilling predictions. Atlas Shrugged essentially just gives a right vs. wrong discourse, and if you don’t agree with the author’s views then you’re definitely wrong. Even Ditko did not go this far with the Objectivism that he injected into his comic book work. He focused more on the individual vs. society themes that Rand touched on at times as well as the consequences of criminal behavior. His work at its best resembled The Prisoner television series from the 60’s and at its worst provided a rather rigid stance on punishment for criminal behavior. Rarely did he really delve into the free market vs. socialism themes that are so prominent in Atlas Shrugged (though you can see some traces of that in characters he created like Killjoy).
So, if you are looking for a book that will preach the gospel of the free market economy and the evils of socialism and labor unions, then Atlas Shrugged is definitely for you. But if you are looking for a bit of speculative fiction that makes you think (and does not tell you how to think) and consider the implications of potential dystopic future scenarios, skip this one. Instead seek out one of the other ones I have recently reviewed like George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (which by the way also takes a somewhat anti-socialist stance) or heck, even Logan’s Run. At least that one’s a fun read unlike Ayn Rands thousand plus page snooze-fest.
Despite the material, the audio book version of Atlas Shrugged was actually quite enjoyable, though only because of the voice work of Edward Herman. He makes the material as lively as can be expected and does an excellent job with the voices of the different characters. In fact, each time he reads for Francisco d’Anconia, I’d swear that Ricardo Montalbahn just stepped into the studio. Note that this audio book version is (thankfully) abridged. But it still runs over twelve hours, and I can’t imagine subjecting anybody outside of Al Qaeda prisoners and far right-wing Republicans to any more of this drudgery. Though if you are so inclined, there is an unabridged audio book version available as well that runs 52 hours long! I hear that doctors prescribe it for people who have insomnia in the worst way.
