Customer Reviews

The Ideas of Ayn Rand

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Given the publisher of this book, I had hoped to find a systematic presentation and evaluation of Ayn Rand's ideas. Unfortunately, both the presentation and evaluation were superficial. The author failed to motivate Rand's ideas by a central theme, and his evalutions were ad hoc and disintegrated.

The book's strongest potential virtue was to delineate Nietzsche's influence on Rand's philosophy. Yet while the author claims that Rand's writings were influenced by Nietzsche, he provides little documentation for any early influence and no evidence for any lasting influence. His claim that Rand derived her critique of Kant from Nietzsche, for example, was never documented. A substantial revision of this section of the book, particularly in light of recent publications, would be warranted--without such a revision, the book has little to recommend it.

Finally, the author's narration of recent scholarly interest in Rand--both inside and outside academia--was also disappo! intingly superficial. His treatment was marred by his conflation of these intellectual developments with much non-scholarly (and uninformative) interest in her personal life and the lives of her self-proclaimed admirers.

With the publication of "Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand," "Letters of Ayn Rand," and "Journals of Ayn Rand," the current volume has been entirely superceded. Save your money.

While the discussions of the influence of Nietzsche on Rand and the analyses of her novels are interesting, the real strength of this book is the clarification and extension of Rand's ethics. The unification of oughts, operational ought and normative ought are the same, the replacement of Man's Life as ultimate end with Man's Life as ultimate means, and his clarification of the goals of ethics (as making yourself the kind of person you should be, rational, productive, and self-improving) are more than worth the price of the book.

He points out the weaknesses and problems with Rand's esthetic theories.

Unfortunately, he does not do the same for Rand's epistemology, which has always been the weakest part of her work.

The last part of the book deals with her attempts to make a practical difference through politics and the continuing disagreements Objectivists have with libertarianism.

The book is also extremely readable and well organized.

This is a nice work in independent commentary and interpretation, something Peikovians cannot stand. And yes, the book has useful commentary.

Free of the subjective rehashing that tainted the summations offered by Leonard Peikoff and the Brandens, this book is a fair, albeit much too brief, representation of Ayn Rand's history, ideas, and continuing legacy. Merril, a true student of Objectivism, is fair and balanced in his book. It is a mistake to rely solely on the admittedly worthy and remarkable works of Peikoff and/or the Brandens without using this book to reconcile the arguments put forth by the three of them in their own accounts. Read this work and make up your own mind.

Long before she died, Ayn Rand was praised as a goddess, and damned as a devil. In all the fuss, her actual ideas and views were generally shoved to one side, to the point where she said in her _Playboy_ interview that she could sympathize with Karl Marx(!) toward the end of his life, when he said that he was not a Marxist. The rather abrupt end of the organized Objectivist movement in 1968 was also the end of a great deal of her influence, and she became a figure more of legend than history long before her death. With this book, Merrill gives us a view of Ayn Rand's actual beliefs, as opposed to those attributed to her by the Usual Suspects, and some background as to how she came to the conclusions she did. It's disappointingly short, but Rand scholarship is evolving constantly.

In recent years, we have witnessed what has aptly been called a "Renaissance" in Ayn Rand scholarship. In 1995, Chris Sciabarra came out with AYN RAND: THE RUSSIAN RADICAL which (although controversial) placed Ayn Rand in the context of the history of philosophy and filled in a few gaps in her biography as well. After that work, the Ayn Rand Institute published lengthy collections of her diaries and letters (although I'd like to see the originals). In 1999, the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies began publishing, which gives Rand's ideas serious attention. Finally, we recently saw the publication of Scott Ryan's critical OBJECTIVISM AND THE CORRUPTION OF RATIONALITY, which surpasses all previous criticism of Rand.

In light of this high quality work and the increase in primary sources available, one might expect that a scholar would come out with a concise 150-200 page book providing a solid and up-to-date overview of Rand's work, dealing with all the major areas of her thought. Unfortunately, such a book is lacking.

The above digression brings me to Ron Merrill's THE IDEAS OF AYN RAND, published in 1991 and therefore before the "Renaissance." There are some good things about this work. First, it is comprehensive. Mr. Merrill provides the reader with an overview of Rand's life, the plots of her novels, an introduction to her philosophy, and her place within the conservative and libertarian traditions. Second, there are a few interesting observations about the influence of Nietzsche on Rand and also some Jewish imagery in Rand's novels. Third, Mr. Merrill appreciates Rand and lets the reader understand why many people are so absorbed by her ideas. Fourth, the discussion of the novels is extensive. Fifth, the work includes a discussion of the Objectivist "movement."

On the other hand, as a guide to Rand's philosophy it leaves a lot to be desired. As an example, the discussion of axioms (so central to Rand) is given 4 lines. However, the "analytic-synthetic dichotomy" is given over a page. And it is presented exclusively in the context of Peikoff's misleading article of the same name. In any event, I don't see how Mr. Merrill's pointing out that W. V. O. ("I espouse a more thorough pragmatism") Quine also objected to the "analytic-synthetic dichotomy" helps his case that this concept is flawed [p. 170, n. 8]. (For a defense of how - contrary to Peikoff - a priori knowledge provides knowledge of "facts of experience," see Brand Blanshard, REASON & ANALYSIS, pp. 249-307, esp. pp. 303-04.)

This book should be read in conjunction with other books on Rand, including Tibor Machan's work, AYN RAND and Chris Sciabarra's AYN RAND: THE RUSSIAN RADICAL.