"Going a long distance out of the way, to come back a short distance correctly"
Atlas Shrugged – Day 103 – pp. 1150-1159
Now we get a little hokey.
Francisco grills the subdued guards. How many guards are there? Where? What are these rooms?
It’s military precision. (You wonder, when you’re an expert at one thing, it would seem, in Rand’s universe, you’re an expert at everything. Continue reading “The Great Escape”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 102 – pp. 1140-1149
No it ain’t.
“Long coils of wire, like the twisted arms of an octopus, stretched forward across the stone floor, from the machine to a leather mattress spread under a cone of violent light. John Galt lay strapped to the mattress, He as naked; the small metal disks of electrodes at the ends of the wires were attached to his wrists, his shoulders, his hips and his ankles…”
Sounds like an impressive creation. Wonder where Dr F bought the kit for that?
They turn on the machine and hear the buzz from the generator and the amplified sound of John Galt’s heartbeat.
Now he makes a fairly ridiculous sounding demand of Galt.
Continue reading “The “Passion” of John Galt (or the end of Jim Taggart)”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 093 – pp. 992-1001
“Listen, kid,” said Rearden sternly, “I want you to do me a favor. …make up your mind that you want to live — just as you did down there on that slag heap…”
Time for a quick comment.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 092 – pp. 982-991
Hank has a solution.
“If it’s production hat you want, the get out of the way, junk all of your damn regulations, let Orren Boyle go broke, let me buy the plant of Associated Steel — and it will be pouring a thousand tons a day from every one of its sixty furnaces.”
Oh, can’t do that. That’d be a monopoly.
“Well then, I’ll offer you another solution. Why don’t you take over my mills and be done with it?”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 091 – pp. 972-981
“You can accept our repentance,” said Lillian in a voice glassy with caution. “I only want you to know that whatever I’ve done, I’ve done it because I loved you.”
Hank ain’t listening to that.
Mother Rearden is approaching panic mode.
“What’s happened to you? What’s changed you like that? You don’t seem to be human anymore!”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 090 – pp. 962-971
D’ja ever read something so good that you couldn’t stop?
That’d be Chapter VI – The Concerto of Deliverance.
Rand’s finally got it going. Far as I’m concerned, this has been the best chapter in the book so far. Made the 962 pages leading up to it all worth the effort.
Plots uncovered. Schemes unraveled. Vengeance. Fight scenes. Heroic deaths. Lives saved, snatched from the jaws of death. And even a rather hokey ending for which I gladly suspended any and all sense of reality. (And, in reality, not even too hokey.)
Yeah, I read it all. But I’m still going 10 pages at a time, so suck it up. Let’s get busy.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 087 – pp. 932-941
I have a question. Why hasn’t JG come after Eddie Willers yet? He’s got to be a candidate for the gulch. And his disappearance would most likely hasten Dagny’s decision..
Anyway, just before Phillip leaves, he tells Hank he’s never had any concern for his feelings. Hanks asks if Phillip has ever had any concern for his. Phillip tells Hank he has no feelings.
Of course Rand would beg to disagree as she recalls ALL the suffering that Hank has been through…
Then she describes the look in Phillip’s eyes…
Atlas Shrugged – Day 086 – pp. 922-931
Hank’s feeling a little melancholy about it all. Like he betrayed Francisco, who was sacrificing for him.
Dagny tells him Francisco did it for them. For them all. (So what the hell are you two doing???)
What is it with these two? What is the drive not to give up? I mean, I understand the will not to give up. No quitters. But like Jim said before, they’re doers. Why not “do” where you can actually do something? Why keep trying to save the lost cause. Are they there for the little guys, like the tramp on the train, who refused to give up even though he was a lost cause too? Maybe. I guess I can see that.
Continue reading “Francisco’s farewell… and trouble for Hank?”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 085 – pp. 909-921
Somehow destroying a company like d’Anconia Copper or Rearden Steel is one thing. But destroying an innocent like Cherryl sinks the whole bunch to a new level of moral depravity. (Not that I’m sentimental, but that bit pissed me off.)
That said, the drama is starting to pick up. I mean it was all well and good living in Atlantis for a month. But the real drama is here where the scumbags live. Hey, call me a jerk. I read the Bible and TMZ.com.
I stopped a couple pages early yesterday. Felt it was the fitting thing to do as the chapter ended with Cherryl. Time to get back on pace.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 079 – pp. 852-861
You know, I’m thinking. Wasn’t Hank Rearden’s motive one of self-interest too? I mean he made a choice. And he chose what he wanted to do. He knows he can re-build Rearden Metal. Maybe he was protecting a higher ideal too — Dagny. She’s the last remnant of capitalist morality in the world. Maybe this was his way of defending her as a principle. Maybe he is the moral hero of the book.
Anyway, on with the show…
Atlas Shrugged – Day 077 – pp. 832-841
“The buildings seemed worn by weeks of summer heat, but the people seemed worm by centuries of anguish.”
Dagny’s back in the Big Apple. Apparently things have gone down hill in just the last month. These ten pages are more or less catch up so I’m just going to hit the highlights. (I want to get moving on that Project X — or Thompson Harmonizer plot twist.)
So she got dropped in Watsonville NE. Made her way to the train she took to the airport. While on the train she realized that her return from the dead was going to be a public affair. (Wait’ll you see how she covers her bases on that!) At the airport boarding the plane she stops a reporter, identifies herself and tell’s him she’s alive before boarding her flight.
The news is out all over by the time she lands.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 058 – pp. 639-648
The romantic moment of truth has finally arrived!
Hank demands to know what Francisco’s doing there.
Francisco’s seen the key in Hank’s hand. He knows what he’s doing there.
Continue reading “Romantic revelations (and more rough sex)”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 052 – pp. 579-588
I’m going to try something a little different starting this evening. Rather than narrate the story like I’ve been doing, I’m going to try to recap a little less and think out loud a little more. A little more color, and a little less play-by-play. I’ll still include quotations from the book that I find particularly arresting, but not too much retyping. (I was starting to feel like I was just rewriting the damn thing!) So let’s see how it goes shall we?
Where were we? Oh yeah. Hank was confronting the Dread pirate Danneskjold (. . .Nah, “Dread Pirate Roberts” from the Princess Bride’s better too. Who names a pirate Ragnar?)
Anyway, Hank and Ragnar. Ragnar is explaining his accounting system to Hank. That he has a rather large account in his name. He has no way of knowing all of what’s been looted from Hank, with the exception of one account where meticulous records are kept.
Continue reading “Pirate bookkeepers and out-of-town legislators”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 058 – pp. 569-578
Eddie continues with his description of the follies. (I’ll condense.)
Atlas Shrugged – Day 057 – pp. 559-568
To climb into Hank’s head for the moment, I’d guess that he thinks they have some evidence about his black market dealings or over-pouring Rearden Metal or something like that.
Dr F pulls a stack of copies out of his brief case. Hotel registries with the name of Mr. and Mrs. J. Smith. (I guess you didn’t need to be so creative back in those days.)
“You know, of course,” said Dr. Ferris softly, “but you might wish to see whether we know it, that Mrs, J. Smith is Miss Dagny Taggart.”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 056 – pp. 549-558
Taggart says he can deliver Hank. That’s some valuable information according to Wesley Mouch.
I should think so.
And immediately on the tail of that nugget, Taggart has another idea. . .
Atlas Shrugged – Day 054 – pp. 529-538
“You know, of course, I won’t allow this to continue. . . I won’t permit you to have her. Not her. Anyone but her. . . . I won’t permit it! You’ll give it up!. . . You’ll give it up, you’ll leave her, you’ll never see her again!”
Hank has a calm reply.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 053 – pp. 519-528
My God! How long have I been gone! Well the move is about done. Pictures to hang and a few more things to organize, but for the most part, I’m all in. I think I set a world record for how much crap one guy can have. Seriously. The whole damn thing took 4 weeks. I know a guy down here who claims he can throw all his stuff in a duffel bag. I’m jealous.
So where were we? Oh yeah! “another death was all but assured…”
Atlas Shrugged – Day 051 – pp. 499-508
All hell has broken loose. The apocalypse is at hand. And the G is still screwing things up.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 050 – pp. 489-498
Just as an aside, I happened across an article in an open tab I was reading about the death of Tony Curtis. A beautiful man if there ever was one. It read:
“As a performer, Mr. Curtis drew on his startlingly good looks. With his dark, curly hair worn in sculptured style later imitated by Elvis Presley and his plucked eyebrows framing pale blue eyes and full lips, Mr. Curtis embodied a new kind of feminized male beauty that came into vogue in the early 50’s”
“A vigorous heterosexual in his widely publicized (not least by himself) private life, he was often case in roles that drew on a perceived ambiguity. . .”
Hank and Francisco are about to engage in a little “boy talk.” I think I’m going to try to keep that image of Tony Curtis in my mind.
Anyway, back to the book.