Ayn Rand
Atlas Shrugged: Part I
The Law of Identity, 2014
About this book
A long novel about the choices of Dagny Taggart and other creators who sustain production as they disappear from society. It unfolds Ayn Rand's ideas about the individual, creation, exchange, and the state through a vast story.
What stayed with me
A friend introduced it to me in 2021, and I bought a three-volume used edition. After lending Part I to a friend, I wanted to read it again badly enough to buy another copy from Amazon. I followed not just the text but its surrounding information.
What remains most strongly is the law of non-contradiction and the attitude that A is A. The imagination of making a new vehicle or country rather than staying chained to something rotten connects to my interest in libertarianism and institutional design. I read it not only for agreement, but for the force with which it carries an extreme philosophy through a whole story.