...of scholars, attacking his brothers upon realizing that his invention -- the “power of the sky” (71) -- would be met only with anger and suspicion when presented to the council. Prior to this incident, Equality retained some faith that his brothers in the council would grasp the importance of his invention and commend him for his contributions to their society; inevitably, however, Equality recognizes the impossibility of his situation as the council berates him and denounces his invention, claiming that since it had not been devised in cooperation with his brothers, it was a sinful abomination that needed to be destroyed. Utilizing her characters as a means for presenting her ideas about morality, Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem illustrates a fundamental truth about the necessity of an objective moral framework within a society. Similarly, in her essay How Does One Live a Rational Life in an Irrational Society?, Rand poses her ideology that morality is objective and an absolute essential to a functional society. In both her essay and in Anthem, Rand explores the necessity for an objective morality in society, blah blah blah, and blah blah blah implications of a society....
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...Free Will in Ayn Rand’s “Anthem” Ayn Rand’s short novel, “Anthem,” depicts a collectivist society where any thoughts are only considered good if they are thought by everyone. Individuality is considered a sin. Children are taken from their parents and raised in a collective unit. One’s vocation is not decided by the individual, but rather appointed to them by a group. The main character, Equality 7-2521 (Prometheus), is a free thinker who longs to learn all he can in hopes of making a contribution to his town, and being promoted to one of the scholars. However, when he presents his discovery (electricity) to the “World Council of Scholars” the group is terrified because they have never seen anything like it before. Prometheus is scorned, rejected, and sentenced to be burned at the stake because of his choosing to think as an individual. Free will is something that many people take for granted these days, but in the world...
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...One very prominent area of a society is its technology. The technology of a society can determine a lot about it, including its way of life. In Ayn Rand’s novel, Anthem the technology is very primitive. There is no electricity, so they live by candle light. There are strides made by the character Equality 7-2521 to improve this. After much hard work, Equality is able to recreate the light bulb. By the way this story is written, you can gather how Rand feels about science, technology, and advances in these areas. From her writing, you can presume that Rand is for technology, science and its improvements. In Anthem, Equality represents technological advances and those who seek them. He sees a lightning bolt and tries to recreate it so humans...
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...To imagine a society without individuality is difficult. A world without the clothes, food, and activities that make us distinct and different from others, perhaps seems implausible. However, in Ayn Rand’s novelette Anthem, this peculiar world without separateness is brought to our attention through the eyes of a protagonist who feels neither equal nor one with his brothers. Equality was motivated by selfishness, which is a prime incentive in human nature. Nevertheless, with his selfishness, he held a certain care for humanity and his brothers, making it moral for him to think this way; if the world were motivated by the same feelings, such as selfishness, or even love, the individuality that is sometimes taken for granted might be lost....
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...A free market economy is an economy where most means of production are privatized and guided and where income is distributed largely through the operation of the market. To many people, it is seen as ultimate freedom and true economic liberty. Others, however, think that it is corrupt. Ayn Rand, the author of the novella Anthem, strongly believed that in order to have a progressive and stable economy, a country must have a free market. This belief is supported by the history of many post-communist countries. The Russian federation is one of the most well known post-communist countries. This is because once a free market was introduced, the countries scientists and scholars had a chance to develop innovations and advance society. With the freedoms...
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...Anthem takes place in a unknown time in the past or future where technology nor science comes to the mind of the society. “A street sweeper walking in upon the world of scholars / It is against all the rules and laws”(69). Ayn Rand’s book Anthem takes place in a dystopian society that the council of vocations control. throughout the book there was not any change in technology over time other than equality discovering electricity. Also the candles that the entire society use took a long process of getting approved and confirmed. The council and scholars disagreed with Equality’s creating which could have been a revolutionary change in technology in Anthem. Technology in Anthem have not been moving forward and have not been improving in fact it might just be forgotten to the society. “We can give our brothers a new light, cleaner and brighter, than any they have ever known” (60). No one under the class of scholar have ever tried to make an invention. Even in the book the scholars aren't even making inventions for the society...
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...egoism can make someone into a narcissistic jerk. In Ayn Rand’s Anthem, the main protagonist Prometheus is not an egoist because even though he is thinking of his own wants and needs, he is also always thinking about how he is going to help the others in his society. In a way, it was bad that he thought of his own wants so much, because he ended up getting severely punished for it. However, if he hadn't gone through those struggles then his life wouldn’t be the same. Like in the speech the “The Soul of an Individualist,” from one of Rand’s other books The Fountainhead, Prometheus wanted to show what he made for the good of everyone, but ended up being shunned for being an individual. Even from the very beginning of the novel, Prometheus always seemed to pay attention to others, giving the reader little notes about who they were or what was...
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...In Ayn Rand’s Anthem, mankind destroys all traces of their materialistic and individualistic past to form a utopia. This so-called utopia is actually more of a dystopian society. Dystopias are defined as an imagined place that is usually totalitarianistic and environmentally degraded. Anthem’s society is one of these societies, due to the tyrannical leadership, lack of technological advancements, the indoctrination of people, beginning at birth, and the loss of individualism. The tyrannical leadership is shown through the ruthless enforcement of unreasonable laws. People were “burned alive in the square of the City” (Rand 49), and theft was punishable by “ten years in the Palace of Corrective Detention” (Rand 18). Technology was also severely...
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...An individual’s creation is a vital component of their identity and individuality, and its power can overcome the rather weak stagnation surrounding an individual. This predicament is scrutinized in Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem, where she applies imagery to express the concept of the significance of creation. Through the use of a simile, Rand describes “the sky…[as] a black sieve pierced by sliver drops that tremble, ready to burst through” to convey how the environment, controlled by the World Council, is trying to extract all creation from society (Rand, 1938, p.32). The silver drops express the creation, that trembles due to its struggle to shine through the screen of limitation yet its readiness to unleashed, conveys of how creation is so...
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...The society ‘Anthem’ takes place in is based solely on the collective, no individualism allowed. This limits the people in the community greatly, and since all the people of the world live under a select group of rulers, in similar communities, new technology is severely limited and must go through 50 years of tests in order to be approved (Rand 74). Any new technology proposed by the council of scholars must be agreed upon by the others, and only the scholars can make new discoveries. Equality had to learn that he could not make discoveries on his own the hard way, and running from this harsh society nearly cost him his invention, as well as his life. Ayn Rand’s short novella tells the story of his illegal discoveries, the people he meets along the way, and how he is changed as a person by the end. The nature of technology here is to be scared, and the conditions for technological advancement are for people to be knowledgeable, risk-takers, and to not be afraid of advancing....
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...ANTHEM QUESTIONS Chapter I – Response 1 In a well-organized paragraph, describe the society in which Anthem is set. Some areas to consider are the political structure, degree of technology, social relationships, quality of life, and education. ALSO comment on the following: ➢ Would you want to live in this society? Explain why or why not. ➢ How would your teachers react if you had Equality’s “curse”? ➢ Why do Equality’s teachers disapprove of his quick mind? Chapter II – Response 2 . Re-read the account of Liberty 5-3000 on or around page 38. Which character traits are revealed in this brief description? . Find several examples of the ways in which this society tries to obliterate each individual’s mind (and self!) by quashing personal choices, desires, and values. . Of the whole range of feelings possible to man (joy, excitement, anger, embarrassment, etc.) why is fear the prevalent emotion in this society? Explain the following terms-- WHAT do each of these terms symbolize? If you think about it, they are easy to label. The Great Truth, the Unmentionable Times, the Uncharted Forest, the Evil Ones, the Great Rebirth Chapter III – Response 3 Clearly, up to this point and beyond, Ayn Rand intended Equality to stand out from his “brothers.” Explain how she accomplishes this by contrasting Equality’s physical qualities and character traits to those of his fellow men. . What...
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...In Ayn Rand’s Anthem, a society is built on the ideology of “Brotherhood” and togetherness. One man, Equality, defies this ideology and threatens the “perfect” society built by the councilmen. When Equality discovers the word “I”, he explains the word “‘we’ must never be spoken, save by one’s choice and as a second thought”. Rand, with this quote, wants one to understand the collectively as a group is harmful and restricts one’s freedom. The communist society is unequal and suppresses one’s freedom. While the people are brainwashed to believe everyone is “equal”, there are still those with higher power and control. In the community the council is the “voice of all men”. Even though the community is thought to be equal, the council...
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...Ayn Rand’s Anthem depicts the dystopian future in which an unnamed society has completely “forgotten” the word ‘I’. While reading Anthem, Ayn Rand introduces Equality 7-2521, the hero who breaks away from the status quo of the unnamed society. Collectivism is the immoral guide for the unnamed society, a guide that Equality challenges to the extent of its extremities. The dictatorial leadership of this society restricts even thinking about one’s self, no one person is obliged to give priority to an individual. Thereupon, we see Equality’s entrance into the society, just by his physical characteristics rebelling against the status quo, being both too tall and too smart. Equality faces his own internal conflicts, he, in his misunderstanding, struggles to understand the gravity of his actions and his true differences from the society’s collectivism....
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...The world described in Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem is technologically primitive, which Equality 7-2521 attributes to mankind’s absence of individuality. Society believes that “‘We are one in all and all in one. There are no men but only the great WE,’” which displays the extent to which men have lost their individuality. Equality 7-2521 blames this “worship of the word ‘We’” as the reason that “all thought, all science, [and] all wisdom perish[ed] on earth.” When men are no longer able to pursue their ideas, but rather comply to the wishes of mankind, there is a distinct absence of science and technology. The government in Anthem strives to maintain the status quo, which is displayed during Equality 7-2521’s presentation to the Council of Scholars, where the Scholars explain their reason for a lack of new inventions: “Many men in the Homes of the Scholars have had strange new ideas in the past. . . but when the majority of their brother Scholars voted against them, they abandon their ideas, as all men must.” The Council of Scholars then describe how Equality 7-2521’s invention would “wreck...
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...Ayn Rand’s Anthem focuses on a society in which individuality is crushed and conformity is the source of survival. A citizen of that society by the name of Equality has been punished all his life because of his differences, those being his outstanding intelligence and physique. He and his peers are taught at the same pace in school, and potentially looked down upon if one did any better than the person next to them. On page 21, Equality says “We tried to forget our lessons, but we always remembered. We tried to not understand what the teachers taught, but we always understood it before the teachers had spoken.” It was the obvious superiority which brought the job of Street Sweeper to Equality, in an effort to restrain his mind usage and brain...
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