Lisa’s Comments (group member since Sep 23, 2009)

Lisa’s comments from the Should have read classics group.

Surprise, I started this last night and have been cruising through it. It is a very sweet book. It make me wonder what The Railway House is like and I would be interested in reading that one also. It is like a written version of Pass It On. Doing something nice for others and then it comes back to you.

It is discussed in the book that the mind and thinking is not something to give up, but celebrate and embrace. I wonder if this can be said about today when certain people bemoan the fact that common sense has diminished in society? Or the fact that test scores have fallen and people are more interested in Hollywood than learning and celebrating education?

I enjoyed this part also, it seemed to go over my head for his speech though. I mentioned in another thread that at times I understood what Rand was trying to say, then I would get confused at what she was saying. I hate to admit that I read/skimmed parts of John Galt's speech, it seemed to actually go on for three hours at times.:)

I'm sure that the certain initiatives that are used in union contracts can sound similar to parts of the Directive. Now, I don't want to generalize about every union, and there is a huge difference between public sector unions and private sector unions(which are the ones that are described mostly in Atlas.) I think that an example that has recently been in the news was the Hostess bankruptcy. Both sides in that one seems to be unyielding and just crazy.

Just wait. It will draw you in even more!

Finally, I am almost done! I go back to the two boys that were in Magnus's village and how Rand described them as curious and self-starting, running around the village. She then talked about mother's that protected their children from every germ and disaster, but let them be fed with "poison" from school and society. Not sure where I'm going with this, but the two pictures of children was interesting. I don't think that she was saying that children should wander free and crazy, but that their minds and ideas should be appreciated.

How about the Directive 10-289? Why would anyone think that it would work, and not kill ambition and work? I would shudder to think of being stuck at some of the jobs that I have had, without the opportunity to leave or advance higher.

I'm actually almost done, whew, and I must say that I had similar feelings at times. I would finally think that I understand something and then I would try to explain it to my husband and not be able to. It is frustrating to try and explain the ideas in this book, not that they annoy me, more to the fact, I'm not quite sure what to say about them.

I read this book at the end of high school and I remember the first part and the ending, but the giant middle is rather a missing mass. I enjoyed the book, but it took me forever to finish it, hopefully, I can go faster this time around. I have it downloaded on my Kindle ready to go, once I finish Atlas Shrugged.

That just adds to the intrigue on this book. I'm going to try and squeeze this in between Atlas and Les Mis, might be nice to cleanse my palette.

Suzanne wrote: "At first when I saw the title, I thought it was The Boxcar Childrenwhich was a book I loved as a child (probably because I thought the idea of living on my own/making was very interesting). This l..."

Thanks for the Kindle update, sometimes these books are hard to find at the library.

Good luck!

Thanks for that Daniel, it would be interesting to read about the back story which inspired Heller, sometimes those stories are more interesting. How is everyone doing with this book so far?

Hello and welcome to the group Dustin! I have enjoyed your participation in Atlas Shrugged and hope that you can find some wonderful classics that you have been wanting to read forever! Thanks for joining and happy reading!

Dustin wrote: "So is it true that things get a bit better after Part I? Is it incredibly slow in the beginning? Please tell me that Rand keeps it interesting, at least.:)"

Tortured analogy time, think of Part I as a one dish buffet that you keep eating from for about 3 weeks, then when you can't take it any more the curtain parts and before you is a Las Vegas style buffet and you keep jumping from dish to dish, not quite sure which one to sample first. That seems to be my take on this book so far, after every three pages right now I want to jump on the computer and pose a question. Hope that helps, and considering that everyone tastes in books are different I hope that my food analogy doesn't make you throw up in the end! :)

I just finished reading the Thanksgiving scene last night, which was rather appropriate for this time of the year. I was finally happy that Rearden finally spoke his peace and then in the next scene at the courtroom, I almost applauded out loud like the crowd. What does everyone think about sanction of the victim idea? I have never thought about it in that term. I wonder what Francisco was going to ask Readen before the smelter accident?

I was actually wondering if he had any military experience, it seemed that he would with some of the stories that he presented.

Actually, you are fine, I'm bringing "snail pace" to a new place with this one. I'm only on page 600, so feel free to join in with us also! It is really interesting and a great story. Enjoy!

That is very clever Cristina! Way to get a system going, I need to figure out something to get to read books down.

I'm sure that is the reason, but would be very hard to hold a long conversation with anyone except the Texan in this book so far.