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. (more…)
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.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 100 – pp. 1120-1129
“The elevator stopped on the mezzanine floor.”
The group was surrounded by soldiers as they approached the door of the WF ballroom.
Chick Morrison opened the door.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 098 – pp. 1100-1109
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Does it always take this long to read the last 100 pages of a book? Or only when you run into the holidays?
OK, I’m still waiting on some threat to the entire world by the Thompson Harmonizer / Project X thing. What a POS red herring that would be if Rand didn’t follow up on it.
Anywho…
John Galt is being held in the Wayne-Falkland Hotel by the band of looters and presently being interrogated by their leader. Mr Thompson has just offered Galt the position of Economic Dictator of the world.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 095 – pp. 1009-1069
Holy crap!!! John Galt has just taken the stage.
Actually he’s used his hulking intellect to commandeer the broadcast.
Hulk Galt say, “Puny looters!”
Certainly, a mind of this superior capacity would obviously have something to say. But Ayn Rand goes nuts. I mean freakin’ nuts. His broadcast, her — what? — diatribe?, lasts for SIXTY pages. SIXTY!
Now, I’m on page 1,009 here. You’d think Rand has gotten her point across by now. I mean, if you can’t deliver a message in this many words… Figure roughly 11 words per line with, pretty consistently 40+ lines per page means 440 words per page times 1,200 pages is in the ballpark estimate of 528,000 words!
If, as a writer, you can’t make a point in over half a million words, maybe you need to find another job.
On the other hand, that’s probably why she leaves a dissertation like this for the very end. We’re all in for a dollar by now.
Anyway, I’m not going to go ten pages at a time for this. I believe (hope) I’ve got the gist. I’m guessing I have an idea of what JG is going to talk about. So I’m going to try to point out some of the highlights of what he says over the course of the broadcast.
(Deep breath) Here we go…
The news reports that reported Hank’s disappearance told everything but the story.
They said things like it was “social treason to ascribe too much importance to Hank Rearden’s disappearance.” Some denied his disappearance entirely. Others reported his untimely demise.
“It was strange she thought, to obtain news by means of nothing but denials…”
But the denials weren’t having their full desired effects.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 089 – pp. 952-961
They’re going to the main signal tower. She consults with the tower director. He starts making calculations.
How are they going to move the train?
Atlas Shrugged – Day 075 – pp. 812-821
But then again, maybe I judge too harshly. Self-interest is the thing that Rand is all about, and Galt is looking out for his interests. OK, maybe he’s not such a liar… Maybe.
Anyway, as they’re saying goodnight, Dagny bursts into a stream of Galt-worship that come dangerously close to blasphemy.
“…my love and my hope to reach you and my wish to be worthy of you on the day when i would stand before you face to face…”
Sounds like a wish of some sort of divine judgment.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 074 – pp. 802-811
I can’t wait!!
“Yes or no, Miss Taggart?”
She’s at a meeting with the “heads” of state — Mulligan, Galt, Francisco and Hugh Akston.
Now I think we all know what her answer will be. The only question is whether she goes back to save the railroad or to save Hank.
So what is her decision?
Atlas Shrugged – Day 073 – pp. 792-801
Galt, Francisco and Dagny walk out to see d’Anconia Copper mine #1.
Francisco and Galt chat but Dagny is watching Francisco. She notices the “quality of his glance whenever it rested on Galt.”
Francisco obviously looks up to Galt. He’s the alpha dog in this pound.
And the way Rand is describing this, or at least the way I’m reading it, it’s leaving me with a little bad taste in my mouth. (Like a really cheap cigar.)
Atlas Shrugged – Day 071 – pp. 772-781
Francisco says:
This country was the only country in history born, not of chance and blind tribal warfare, but as a rational product of man’s mind. this country was build on the supremacy of reason — and , for on magnificent century it redeemed the world.
Indeed. The birth of the US was brought about by thinking men. Men who understood the dangers of unchecked power and the different guises that tyranny assumes. Our founding fathers. They had a vision. They brought that vision to life. And in the ensuing centuries, it has become corrupted by — what I’d say are inevitable forces of “civilized” society.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 069 – pp. 752-761 (One extra page at the end of the last chapter.)
Chapter 2 – Utopia of Greed! (Don’t know but it sounds good.)
So it’s morning and Dagny wakes up to see John Galt who’s already working at his desk.
She broke something on the “ray screen” of the power plant when she crashed so he has to run off and do his “handy man” thing. Dagny insists on cooking breakfast while he’s at work.
Getting kind of domestic after only one day.
As she’s cooking, a man she’s never seen runs up and in through the front door.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 066 – pp. 721-730
I just had a thought. All these men of industry are creating a veritable capitalist paradise in Mulligan’s mysterious valley. Cashing in on the power of their minds. Exchanging value for value.
But. . .
How do they plan to re-enter society? I mean, I’m guessing here, they eventually plan on returning to the world once it’s crushed itself. Rebuilding out of the ashes. Francisco has pretty much said that outright.
The G will fall and the currency will be debased to nothing. . . but how do you erase an ingrained sense of entitlement? How do you wash that out of the public’s psyche?
Sure there will be those who are still of an industrious bent, like our little tramp friend on the train. But like the woman on the train (who I forgot to mention — who felt entitled to transportation — who called Taggart Trans a “common carrier”), how do you purge that out of society? Won’t she still be hanging around somewhere?
I really can’t see them coming back in the face of that. Just wondering. I’m sure we’ll find out. . .
Anyway, on with the show.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 065 – pp. 711-720
Galt tells Dagny he’s been watching her (from the cafeteria via Eddie) and quotes her thing about the destroyer draining the brains of the world. She asks how long he’s been watching her. . .
“For years.”
The manner in which Rand describes his reply kind of gives me the feeling that maybe John Galt has a thing for Dagny too. I guess I’m not surprised. Hank, Francisco, Eddie and now JG. Will there be a battle for Dagny’s heart at the end? Doesn’t seem like it would fit in this book.
Atlas Shrugged – Day 064 – pp. 701-710
Welcome to Part III entitled “A is A” (What the hell does that mean?)
When last we left our heroine, she was at the stick of a P-51 North American Mustang fighter plane, gunning down Nazis over Alsace Lorraine, France. . .
Atlas Shrugged – Day 058 – pp. 569-578
Eddie continues with his description of the follies. (I’ll condense.)
Atlas Shrugged – Day 052 – pp. 509-518
High drama. In the movies I think there’s a name for this. Of course I don’t know what it is. The board wants Dagny to recommend dismantling the only profitable line in the Taggart Trans system. The line she built…
Atlas Shrugged – Day 037 – pp. 359 -368
“He would not work for me, so is probably the kind of man you want”
A young physicist from the Utah Institute of Technology…
His name . . .