Goddess of the Market

Ayn Rand and the American Right

By: Jennifer Burns

Narrated by: Suzanne Toren

Worshipped by her fans, denounced by her enemies, and forever shadowed by controversy and scandal, the novelist and philosopher Ayn Rand was a powerful thinker whose views on government and markets shaped the conservative movement from its earliest days. Drawing on unprecedented access to Rand's private papers and the original, unedited versions of Rand's journals, Jennifer Burns offers a groundbreaking reassessment of this key cultural figure, examining her life, her ideas, and her impact on conservative political thought. Goddess of the Market follows Rand from her childhood in Russia through her meteoric rise from struggling Hollywood screenwriter to bestselling novelist, including the writing of her wildly successful The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Burns highlights the two facets of Rand's work that make her a perennial draw for those on the right: Her promotion of capitalism, and her defense of limited government. Both sprang from her early, bitter experience of life under Communism, and became among the most deeply enduring of her messages, attracting a diverse audience of college students and intellectuals, business people and Republican Party activists, libertarians and conservatives. The book also traces the development of Rand's Objectivist philosophy and her relationship with Nathaniel Branden, her closest intellectual partner, with whom she had an explosive falling out in 1968.

©2009 Oxford University Press, Inc. (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Insightful

Suzanne does a wonderful job reading Jennifer Burns book on Ayn. I have always enjoyed Ayn’s work and am constantly having to defend my enjoyment of her books. This provides additional insight into the writer and the motivation behind her most accomplished work.

Jennifer Burns is a masterful writer

This book is a model for excellent writing, especially noteworthy for keeping a fair balanced tone and appraisal of someone as divisive as Rand.

Fascinating

Lifelong fan of Ayn Rand’s books and political philosophy, I was impressed by how well written and narrated this book was. I listened to it in a complete sprint. Unable to stop. I have much better insight into Rand’s fiction and characters, and her influence on American political thought.

The more I learn the less I respect

This book does a lot. She looks not only at Rand's life, but those who influenced her thinking, her developing ideas, and the impacts her ideas have had on the world at large. Given the content of her novels a lot of what appears in these pages shouldn't be surprising. She appears cut off from reality in so many ways. She either couldn't recognize or couldn't acknowledge that no idea is completely original, it all stands on the ideas of those that came before us. And, it is that insecurity which so limited her ideas and development. I am stunned by the impact she has had, and I failed to recognize the long reach in to so many areas. It is shocking that such poor work as Rand's has been taken so seriously by so many. This is a very important area of study. And, you get the see the problem where things like the 2008 crash which should raise questions about the viability of the unrestricted Free Market, only gets answered with "the true free market doesn't exist" and that, they see as the problem. I think the author does a great job and looking at the underpinnings of Rand's ideas. If anyone needed to "check their premises, " it was Rand herself. It's noteworthy to see who young she was when the Russian Revolution devastated her family. I've although thought that had a profound influence on her thinking. In her novels, there is a "collectivist" under every bush, and the rants at the end of her life, seem to confirm this paranoid world view.

Wow!

I learned more about Ayn Rand than I ever thought I needed to know. Well written book. Expertly narrated.

A balanced perspective rooted in historical facts

This was a great telling of Ayn Rand’s life. I was afraid it’d be too partisan but instead it offered a balanced perspective. Rand lived a fascinating life. Jennifer Burns captured her life and put it in a historical context like no other could.

Unfortunate

Example of a biography where the writer has already a bias. In this case negativity is clearly seen.

Valuable for historical context-but not much else

There is a lot here in terms of Rand's life in terms of her relations with people - like von Mises, her "collective", her relations with those in the upper echelons of the Libertarian movement, politicians, friends, and family. But her analysis of the relations and how they impacted Rand have to be weighed against this author's clear misunderstandings of the deeper constructs of Objectivism. I think it is much like someone with a bit of Algebra skills trying to take on the PhD thesis of a masterful mathematician. Without a highly skilled level of mathematical skill - it is hardly believable that they could understand the concepts involved - especially to the level of throwing mud on the ideas of the mathematician s complex thesis. This is the case here. The little jabs, digs, and commentary when she obviously doesn't understand Rand's philosophy in more than a superficial study is annoying. I like the context of what were some of Rand's relations, sources, etc... as it gives me more to research further myself. I would like to see what Rand saw in developing her ideas. It helps to further strengthen one's own knowledge - first handedly instead of simply taking someone's word on something - including Rand's. But, for people that may see this without a strong knowledge of Rand's works and Objectivism - it can easily lead to those with the actually childish observation, that Objectivism and Rand were juvenile. I suppose for a person with a juvenile understanding of the Objectivist system of philosophy - that may appear to be the case. More knowledge is valuable - so it is worth something. But not as a source of knowledge of what was in Rand's mind or into the philosophic system of Objectivism.