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Atlas Shrugged: Difference between revisions
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It's [[Twenty Minutes Into the Future]]. The government is [[Strawman Political|evil and stupid]], intent on [[The Two Certainties in Britain|draining]] the decent, productive, people dry. The average Joe is clamped hard on the [[Mary Suetopia|government teat]], and [[Villain With Good Publicity|happy about it]]. The people are [[Les Collaborateurs]], busy [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|gaming]] the system for every drop before it crashes, or [[Utopia Justifies the Means|self-deluded]] fools certain they can fix everything with just a LITTLE more control. There is no [[La Résistance|public resistance]].
Worse, the [[Apathetic Citizens|few people]] who are still productive are [[Screw This, I'm Outta Here|disappearing, one by one.]] No one ever hears from them again, and their friends and relatives are left with nothing but a question:
"[[Driving Question|Who is John Galt?]]"
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<!-- %%To be clear, this page is about describing ''Atlas Shrugged''. If you wish to evaluate it, please feel free to contribute to the review section. No [[ComplainingAboutShowsYouDontLike complaining about philosophies you disagree with]], please. -->
{{tropelist}}
* [[Achilles in His Tent]]: The idea behind John Galt's strike.
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* [[Ambition Is Evil]]: The book's villains think this. The protagonists repeatedly say the exact opposite: they consider the ''lack'' of ambition to be the ultimate evil. The latter point is one of the book's main [[An Aesop|Aesops]].
* [[America Saves the Day]]: Simultaneously averted and played straight. Averted in that in the world of the novel, the USA is [[Just Before the End|well on track]] to becoming just like the [[Commie Land|People's States]] it regularly sends government aid to (and, by the end of the novel, American society has indeed collapsed). Two heroes (D'Anconia and Ragnar The [[Warrior Poet|Philosopher Pirate]]) are Argentinian and Scandinavian, respectively. Present in that all of the novel's heroes extol (what they refer to as) American values and the majesty of a country founded on the pursuit of individual happiness. By the end of the novel all the productive people are living in lovely Colorado.
* [[Anti
** Although Rand intended her protagonists to be morally unassailable, even many people who agree with the book's message don't perceive them as pure heroes.
** Dagny Taggart and Francisco D'Anconia are somewhere between Type III and Type IV, Hank Rearden is more of a Type II. John Galt is arguably a Type III, albeit only to his enemies.
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* [[Brick Joke]]: Remember how Dagny returns from Galt's Gulch just in time to hear that the engines from their star line and ''the cars from a coal run'' were being appropriated to pick up a shipment of '''grapefruit'''? Two-hundred and fifty pages later, after the looters have captured Galt, it's mentioned that Mr. Thompson's doctor had prescribed him grapefruit juice to help with an "epidemic" of colds. '''''And we learn of this because they just at that moment ran out of juice. Right up until the collapse, resources were put aside so the Head Of State could have grapefruit juice.'''''
* [[Broken Pedestal]]: Dr. Robert Stadler, brilliant and idealistic scientist who becomes just another part of the looters' machine.
* [[Brother
* [[Cain and Abel]]: James and Dagny Taggart; Phillip and Hank Rearden.
* [[Character Filibuster]]: Quite a few. A ''three hour long'' speech appears verbatim, ''right before the climax''. After that, the rest look like zingers.
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* [[Completely Missing the Point]]:
** After listening to Galt's three-hour long tirade about the evils of government interference in industry, the looters proceed to capture him and offer him the role of economic director, a job in which he will be free to run industry as he sees fit.
** After Dagny returns from her idyllic sojourn in Galt's Gulch, James Taggart (who probably majored in Missing the Point) brags about how much money he has made the railroad in her absence. He gloats, because all Dagny ever cared about was making lucre. He "made" that money by [[Screw the Rules, I Have Connections|pulling strings with his friends]] to get the government to give him outrageous subsidies and advantages. Dagny's... not impressed.
** James...again, after his sister's dynamo performance on Bertram Scudder's radio program. When Cheryl asks him about Dagny's comments, James responds by attacking Scudder and pointing out that he has been kicked off the radio. Cheryl becomes quite exasperated.
* [[Compliment Backfire]]:
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* [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]]: Various villains, notably James Taggart and Orren Boyle. The heroes have also been accused, in-universe, of embodying this trope.
* [[Corrupt Politician]]: Just about every politician in the book is either a weak, amoral slug or a deliberately destructive leech.
* [[Crapsack World]]: Intellectuals such as Balph Eubank and Simon Pritchett like to present the world as one of these, a place where [[Don't Think, Feel|reason and logic are useless]], [[Cosmic Horror Story|man cannot achieve anything significant in the universe]], and [[Misery Builds Character|suffering is the essence of life]]. The general state of the world seems to imply that they are right, except that ''[[Self
* [[
* [[The Dark Side Will Make You Forget]]: Dr. Stadler
* [[Dead Air]]: After John Galt hacks the radio transmissions and delivers his speech, the other characters do anything to fill up the dead air afterward, but this is treated more as a [[Follow the Leader]] response of the radio producers that came before them.
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* [[Do Not Adjust Your Set]]: Your radio set, anyway.
* [[Don't Think, Feel]]: [[Deconstruction|Deconstructed]]. The villains of the piece base their economic policies on emotionalism and feelings and (what they call) 'love for others'.
* [[Doorstopper]]: It's nearly as long as the Bible, and is one of the longest fiction novels in English.
* [[Double Standard]]: Within the world of the novel. Dr. Ferris lampshades this when he [[Blackmail|threatens]] Hank Rearden with the public revelation of his affair with Dagny, mentioning that Rearden's own "conquest" would be perceived as [[A Man Is Not a Virgin|normal]], even admirable by some, while Dagny would be seen as a slut and be totally dishonoured. The fear of tarnishing Dagny's good name is exactly what drives Rearden to cave in to the looters' demands. Possibly averted when Dagny ''proudly'' declares on public radio how she has been Rearden's mistress, and actually receives some ''admiration''.
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* [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good]]: After capturing Galt, the various Looters try and talk him into helping them out. We see President Thompson's conversation at length, and it's clear he cannot understand anything Galt believes. The two talk past each other most of the time.
* [[Evil Counterpart]]:
** [[Self
** Kinnan is particularly interesting: true to both this and Kinnan's trope, he's not just the only Looter who gives half a damn about his employees, he's the only one who's ''aware that they're going to lose''. He emerges from a meeting with Galt saying that he enjoyed the conversation, particularly Galt's [[Brutal Honesty]], and then '''calmly admits''' that as a career criminal like himself would be pointless in a world without regulations, he would be "the first one to go down the drain '''''[[Graceful Loser|when]]''''' (Galt) wins."
* [[Fallen Hero|Fallen Mentor]]: Dr. Stadler was one of Galt, Danneskjold, and d'Anconia's mentors in college, and a confidant for Dagny.
* [[Family
* [[Fake Ultimate Hero]]: James plays this to Cherryl after they meet.
* [[False Flag Operation]]: The siege of the Rearden Steel plant, which was planned to be passed off as a workers' riot to encourage Hank to accept the Steel Unification Plan.
* [[Fascist but Inefficient]]: The looters' policies end up turning America into this, with critical resource shortages, riots, greatly increased unemployment rates, and [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|trains not running on time]] all across the nation. By the end of the novel American society has pretty much collapsed.
* [[Fiction 500]]: Too many examples. The Taggarts, the D'Anconias, Midas Mulligan, and Hank Rearden are a few. Ironically, John Galt is ''not'' one.
* [[For Science!]]: Dr. Stadler supported the State Science Institute for the sake of freeing scientific research from the shackles of corporate funding. [[Start of Darkness|He started going downhill]] [[It Got Worse|from there]].
* [[Gambit Pileup]]: Heavily implied to be occurring in this world especially when it is revealed that Wesley Mouch, at one point the most powerful man in the United States, is "the zero at the meeting point of forces unleashed in destruction against one another" -- that is, he's enough of a non-entity to satisfy rival factions trying to put their "friends" in important positions and keep their enemies out. Also occurs every other page between the "businessmen" who are incapable of earning an honest living helping each other and stabbing each other in the back as the plot demands.
* [[Good Bad Girl]]: Dagny Taggart. She doesn't exactly have a world-beating sex drive, but she is absolutely guiltless about the sex she does have and has sex because she wants to have sex. She also engages in two relationships which would be considered morally controversial by some people's standards; first, a teenage passion with Francisco D'Anconia whilst they are underage, and second, an affair with married man Hank Rearden (which she gleefully rubs in his [[Sex Is Evil|prudish]] wife's face).
* [[Good People Have Good Sex]] / [[Good Adultery, Bad Adultery]]: Dagny's affair with married man Hank Rearden is portrayed as an exalted, beautiful and fulfilling relationship, wheras Hank's wife Lillian (a villain) believes [[Sex Is Evil]] and uses Hank's guilt over his fondness for sex to control and manipulate him. In contrast, James Taggart's one-night stand with Lillian is treated as disgusting, as those involved are doing so not out of their enjoyment of the act itself, ''but out of their (mistaken) belief that the act will somehow harm Hank Rearden.'' '''James actually calls Lillian "Mrs. Rearden"''' '''''as he gets off.'''''
* [[Gotterdammerung]]: Rand saw the "[[Self
* [[Grail in The Garbage]]: The revolutionary, but abandoned, motor at the remains of the Twentieth Century Motor Company, which is a metaphor for the importance of reason as a whole and what the world of the novel has allowed to be done to it.
* [[Have a Gay Old Time]]:
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* [[Hobbes Was Right]]: Whenever a looter's [[Utopia Justifies the Means|utopian plan]] for a world without self-interest [[Failure Is the Only Option|goes bad]], they will claim the failure is due to [[Never My Fault|this trope]]. The novel very much insinuates that Hobbes was ''wrong'', and Galt deconstructs this trope in his speech when he mentions that those who damn humanity should have a good look at the moral code they are judging humanity by.
* [[Holding Out for A Hero]]: One of the central themes of the book, the looters can't get anything done on their own. At one point, the government tries to force John Galt to help them. He says no.
* [[Honor Before Reason]]: Eddie Willers' last-ditch expedition to re-establish transcontinental rail service. Dagny tries but fails to talk him out of it. This results in what may very possibly lead to a [[Downer Ending|downer ending]] for Eddie, which can be considered a [[Family
* [[Hope Spot]]: The immediate aftermath of the first ride on the John Galt Line. For a brief moment, it looks like Rearden, Dagny and Wyatt might well be able to save the country in spite of its leadership. Things don't work out that way, as Wyatt predicted.
* [[Humans Are Special]]: John Galt's view is that humans are the only species that use ''reason'' to survive and achieve, as well as the only species to be capable of deliberate self-destruction. About half of Galt's [[Character Filibuster]] reads like a [[Patrick Stewart Speech]] about the virtues of human beings at their best.
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* [[I'm Not Here to Make Friends|I'm Not Here To Make Friends]]: "I don't give a damn about 'the public good'. I'm running a business."
* [[Inferred Holocaust]]: Actually ''stated.'' When the lights of New York go out, Galt's Gulch is the ''last'' industrial power on Earth.
* [[In Your Nature to Destroy Yourselves]]: Averted. John Galt claims that humanity has been acting to destroy itself for most of its history: however, this is ''not'' insinuated to be part of basic human nature, but a choice made based on the attempt to follow [[Family
* [[Insult Backfire]]: Midas Mulligan, banker and striker; he legally changed his name from "Michael" when his enemies gave him the nickname.
* [[Ironic Echo]]: Stadtler considers [[My Greatest Failure|his greatest failure]] to be a student with "the kind of intelligence one expects to see, in the future, changing the course of the world" which "vanished without a trace into the great unknown of mediocrity." Rearden pessimistically says that if the creator of the super-motor was still alive, "The whole world would know his name by now." Ivy Starnes remembers the second man to quit when she took over Twentieth Century Motors, but not the first - "He wasn't anybody important." Akston slyly notes that though he knows the student Stadtler speaks of, but that "[[Exact Words|His name would mean nothing to you.]] [[From a Certain Point of View|He is not famous.]]" The man's name? '''''[[Arc Words|"Who is John Galt?"]]'''''
* [[It Amused Me]]: At first played straight, and later subverted, with Francisco d'Anconia who tells Dagny that the purposefully orchestrated San Sebastian disaster was “much funnier” than a recent divorce scandal. He also doesn't deny it when Dagny accuses of him “seeking a thrill” by destroying industry and swindling dumb investors.
* [[It Is Beyond Saving]]: John Galt and his followers feel this way about America.
* [[
* [[
* [[I Want My Beloved to Be Happy]]:
** Deconstructed, but ''still'' played straight; Rand defined Romantic love as a capitalist exchange of values like any other; affection for affection, gratification for gratification. Under this definition, a [[Yandere]] would be just another Looter, gratifying themselves with their "beloved's" pain: - better to break it off cleanly. And one vertex of a love triangle breaking away before things are settled will only leave ''everyone'' bitter about what could have been.
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* [[James Bondage]]: Galt during his electrical torture scene.
* [[Just Before the End]]: The entire book is the fall of industrial society.
* [["Just Joking" Justification]]: Lillian Rearden often uses this as her excuse after insulting Hank.
* [[Just Like Robin Hood]]: ''[[Inversion|inverted]]'' with Ragnar Danneskjold, kinda. He steals from the Government relief convoys to hasten the end and get hard currency for those whose property was taken so they can rebuild after the strike.
* [[Just Plane Wrong]]: Averted by simply not getting too technical, right up until Dagny's crash, where she follows the other aircraft's "taillights" and clings to the "steering wheel." Also, she tends to "leap behind the wheel" and take off without any kind of preflight--which is not impossible, just inadvisable.
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* [[Messianic Archetype]]: Galt, complete with a [[Crucified Hero Shot]] as he's enduring [[Electric Torture]] at the hands of the villains. Subverted, since he's not acting out of altruism.
* [[The Mole]]: Eddie Willers, unknowingly, in a way. He tells everything about what's happening with Dangy Taggart and Taggart Transcontinental to a man in a cafe, not realizing that man is John Galt.
* [[Morally
* [[My Girl Is Not a Slut]]: [[Gender Flip|Gender Flipped]] and [[Subverted Trope|subverted]]. After Hank Rearden and Dagny Taggart's first sex scene, it is ''Hank'' that plays the "fallen woman" routine; he pleads for Dagny's forgiveness for [[Sex Is Evil|"debasing himself by giving in to his low, animalistic desires"]]. [[Author Avatar|Dagny]] considers it utterly ridiculous that anyone could ''possibly'' hold such shame for being a sexual creature, and bursts out into laughter.
* [[
** Dagny's brother has nothing to do with [[Taggart|a Scottish detective who solves murders]].
** Or with [[Wing Commander (Video Game)|a Scottish (well, actually Venusian) fighter pilot/secret agent/politician]], either.
* [[Never My Fault]]: Pretty much every unadmirable character in the book will refuse to take responsibility for things which they actually ''are'' responsible for. Contrast this with the heroes, who will take responsibility or downright abuse even when they morally shouldn't. The latter approach is treated much more favourably, but it's also insinuated that both these tropes are examples of refusing to acknowledge reality.
* [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero]]: Dagny accidentally ''leads'' the Looters to Galt.
* [[Non
* [[No Plans, No Prototype, No Backup]]: Subverted for Galt's Engine. He left ''all three'' behind at the Starnes Motor Company, and all it did was ''suggest'' that it existed. Looters(both high and common) tear up the engine and components for spare parts, and leave the papers to rot. Even when Dagny realizes what she has, almost all of the "engineers" she calls upon to study the remains refuse to believe it could work. Plans, prototypes and backups are only useful to people of the same degree of intelligence as their inventors.
* [[Nuclear Weapons Taboo]]: Nukes may have not yet even been around when the idea behind Project Xylophone came together.
* [[Omnicidal Maniac]]: Jim Taggart has a [[Villainous Breakdown]] when he realises that he is this.
* [[
* [[Pirate]]: Ragnar Danneskjold, who is also an [[Alternate Character Interpretation]] of ''[[Robin Hood]]'' that walks like a man.
* [[Obstructive Bureaucrat]]: The world is just filled to the brim with these.
* [[Obviously Evil]]: The evil characters are all physically grotesque with either bulbous nose or a potbelly or watery eyes or bad posture and have ridiculous names like Orren Boyle, Wesley Mouch and Tinky Holloway. The good characters by contrast are always tall, thin and handsome with haughty, angular faces and good posture. [[Subverted]] with Midas Mulligan, a good guy who is short and stocky and again with Dr. Ferris, the book's most evil vilain who is given no description other than being tall, thin and graceful.
* [[Peace and Love Incorporated]]:
** All of the villainous businessmen claim to be working only for "the public good", while in fact they are [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|anything]] [[Screw the Rules, I Have Connections|but]]. The heroic businessmen make no secret of the fact they are only out to make money: or so it seems. Most seem to actually be motivated more by [[Doing It for The Art|the love of running a business well]] than anything.
** Twentieth Century Motors under the leadership of the Starnes children is a notable example. The two brothers were pretty much hypocrites, but Ivy Starnes was quite sincere and had no interest in money. The workers found her to be the most loathsome of the three siblings.
* [[
* [[Pet the Dog]]: Dr. Stadler shows genuine interest in the motor which Dagny finds, and his speech about how he is so pleased to see a new, brilliant idea which is not his own is very touching. For a while it seems he may have [[Hope Spot|some hope of redemption]] as he recommends a scientist who may be able to reconstruct it to Dagny...[[It Got Worse|it didn't last]] though.
* [[Propaganda Machine]]: The press, as seen starting with the campaign to slander Rearden Metal.
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* [[Science Is Bad]]: Various characters believe this, especially Balph Eubank who believes that machines have destroyed humanity's connection to the earth, to the point where women are now [[Stay in The Kitchen|running railroads instead of raising children]]. Averted with Dr. Stadler, however: He has become a villain but this is only because he is using science to serve the looters.
* [[Science Marches On]]: Trains and radios being impressively important, a copper-iron alloy is set to replace steel, palm-activated locks are popular...
* [[Screw the Money, I Have Rules]]:
** Hank Rearden turns down a large lump payment of government money for the rights to Rearden Metal, because he is proud of the fact that he invented it and of the ''honest'' money he could make with it.
** Promising young scientist Quentin Daniels turned down Dr. Stadler's offer of a presumedly prestigious post at the State Science Institute due to his views on governmental involvement in science. When Dagny first meets him, he is working as [[Almighty Janitor|night watchman at an abandoned technical institute]].
* [[Screw the Rules, I Have Connections]]: The bonds of [[Blackmail|"friendship"]] among the looters, a.k.a. the "Aristocracy of Pull".
* [[Screw the Rules, I Have Money]]:
** Hank Rearden resorts to this when he finally decides to divorce his wife Lillian.
** Dagny does this to a couple of legislators during the construction of the John Galt Line. However, it is implied that the rules she is bribing to get around are just [[Obstructive Bureaucrat|obstructive red tape]]. She also orders her employees to bribe any officials trying to hinder new track being laid around the Taggart Tunnel after its cave-in, but since the government has [[Moral Event Horizon|passed Directive 10-289 at that point]] she can't really be blamed.
* [[Screw the Rules, I Make Them]]: The looters frequently resort to "public-spirited" laws with [[Loophole Abuse|huge loopholes]] meant to hurt their enemies, like the "Anti Dog-Eat-Dog Rule" or Directive 10-289.
* [[Screw This, I'm Outta Here]]: The job deserters after Directive 10-289.
* [[Self Immolation]]: Subverted. When a government committee tries to get Hank Rearden to agree to participate in a ''Steel Unification Plan'', he points out it's basically a scheme to confiscate his wealth in order to give it to his largest competitor, because it would force him to immolate his company by operating at a loss until he went bankrupt. When told that the measure was only temporary, Rearden points out, "There is no such thing as a temporary suicide."
* [[Self
** Hank Rearden, John Galt. Most of the minor heroic industrialists, such as the Starnes heirs' father, are also hinted or outright stated to be this.
** Inverted by Orren Boyle, who likes to present himself as one of these but in fact got the majority of his head start using a hundred million dollar loan from the government.
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* [[Serious Business]]: A whole philosophy and cult of personality sprang up around Ayn Rand and her literature. The philosophy itself is still going; the cult of personality has significantly waned (especially after she died).
* [[Sex Is Evil and I Am Horny|Sex is Evil and I am Horny]]: Rearden says exactly this after his first time with Dagny, who promptly tells him he's being stupid.
* [[Shut UP, Hannibal]]
* [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism]]: ''Very'' cynical in its appraisal of the motivations of high government officials who wish to exercise control over the country. However, Rand had a decidedly idealistic take on humanity as a whole, or at least human potential, and she also argued for a very benevolent conception of the world itself (i.e. she denied any person's joy need come at any other person's cost).
* [[Smug Snake]]: If you're not a Striker or a [[Muggle]], you're a Looter and smug about it. But ''especially'' Dr. Floyd "Why Do You Think You Think" Ferris.
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* [[Steel Mill]]: The one at Rearden Steel headquarters is given some description. Unusually for the setting, it is described positively.
* [[Strawman Political]]: Most of the villains.
* [[Straw Loser]]: Lee Hunsacker, former wannabe big industrialist who sued banker Midas Mulligan for refusing to give him a loan he couldn't possibly pay back, hates everybody and everything for not "giving him a chance", and [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|refuses to do the dishes]].
* [[Take That]]: Earns more than a few. The book itself throws the middle finger at Christianity, Marxism and all their intellectual and philosophical descendants (and antecedents, too). There are a handful of specific people targeted: several of the looters say "in the long run we're all dead," which is a verbatim quote from economist John Maynard Keynes. When President Thompson signs the most odious of the economic legislation, he says the government will keep trying different tactics until something works. Franklin Roosevelt said much the same thing when launching The New Deal.
* [[Taking You With Me]]: Oil tycoon Ellis Wyatt sets his fields ablaze as a parting shot before disappearing.
* [[Talking the Monster To Death|Talking The Reader To Death]]
* [["The Reason You Suck" Speech]]: John Galt's Speech, three whole hours of uninterrupted castigating that no one can escape from.
* [[Title Drop]]: Unintentional, with the novel being renamed as publication neared.
* [[The Trickster]]: John Galt, Francisco d'Anconia and Ragnar Danneskjold.
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* [[Utopia Justifies the Means]]: The government, the public, the heroes. Pretty much everybody. Done intentionally.
* [[The Vamp]]: Lillian Rearden, who we discover married Hank just to drive him to have an affair and break his spirit.
* [[Viewers
* [[Villain Ball]]: The looters' policies hurt the protagonists a lot, but hardly benefit the looters themselves. Especially [[Egregious|egregious]] when several laws are passed as part of a plot to 'kill Colorado'.
* [[Villain With Good Publicity]]: The looters in general.
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[[Category:Philosophical Novel]]
[[Category:Atlas Shrugged]]
[[Category:Literature]][[Category:Pages with comment tags]]
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