Use of fiction by Ayn Rand

National Review ^ | 1957 | Whittaker Chambers

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

The Ballad of Lenin's Tomb

This is the yarn he told me
As we sat in Casey's Bar,
That Rooshun mug who scammed from the jug
In the Land of the Crimson Star;
That Soviet guy with the single eye,
And the face like a flaming scar.

Where Lenin lies the red flag flies, and the rat-grey workers wait
To tread the gloom of Lenin's Tomb, where the Comrade lies in state.
With lagging pace they scan his face, so weary yet so firm;
For years a score they've laboured sore to save him from the worm.
The Kremlin walls are grimly grey, but Lenin's Tomb is red,
And pilgrims from the Sour Lands say: "He sleeps and is not dead."
Before their eyes in peace he lies, a symbol and a sign,
And as they pass that dome of glass they see - a God Divine.
So Doctors plug him full of dope, for if he drops to dust,
So will collapse their faith and hope, the whole combine will bust.
But say, Tovarich; hark to me . . . a secret I'll disclose,
For I did see what none did see; I know what no one knows.

I was a Cheko terrorist - Oh I served the Soviets well,
Till they put me down on the bone-yard list, for the fear that I might tell;
That I might tell the thing I saw, and that only I did see,
They held me in quod with a firing squad to make a corpse of me.
But I got away, and here today I'm telling my tale to you;
Though it may sound weird, by Lenin's beard, so help me God it's true.
I slouched across that great Red Square, and watched the waiting line.
The mongrel sons of Marx were there, convened to Lenin's shrine;
Ten thousand men of Muscovy, Mongol and Turkoman,
Black-bonnets of the Aral Sea and Tatars of Kazan.
Kalmuck and Bashkir, Lett and Finn, Georgian, Jew and Lapp,
Kirghiz and Kazakh, crowding in to gaze at Lenin's map.
Aye, though a score of years had run I saw them pause and pray,
As mourners at the Tomb of one who died but yesterday.
I watched them in a bleary daze of bitterness and pain,
For oh, I missed the cheery blaze of vodka in my brain.
I stared, my eyes were hypnotized by that saturnine host,
When with a start that shook my heart I saw - I saw a ghost.
As in foggèd glass I saw him pass, and peer at me and grin -
A man I knew, a man I slew, Prince Boris Mazarin.

Now do not think because I drink I love the flowing bowl;
But liquor kills remorse and stills the anguish of the soul.
And there's so much I would forget, stark horrors I have seen,
Faces and forms that haunt me yet, like shadows on a screen.
And of these sights that mar my nights the ghastliest by far
Is the death of Boris Mazarin, that soldier of the Czar.

A mighty nobleman was he; we took him by surprise;
His mother, son and daughters three we slew before his eyes.
We tortured him, with jibes and threats; then mad for glut of gore,
Upon our reeking bayonets we nailed him to the door.
But he defied us to the last, crying: "O carrion crew!
I'd die with joy could I destroy a hundred dogs like you."
I thrust my sword into his throat; the blade was gay with blood;
We flung him to his castle moat, and stamped him in its mud.
That mighty Cossack of the Don was dead with all his race....
And now I saw him coming on, dire vengeance in his face.
(Or was it some fantastic dream of my besotted brain?)
He looked at me with eyes a-gleam, the man whom I had slain.
He looked and bade me follow him; I could not help but go;
I joined the throng that passed along, so sorrowful and slow.
I followed with a sense of doom that shadow gaunt and grim;
Into the bowels of the Tomb I followed, followed him.

The light within was weird and dim, and icy cold the air;
My brow was wet with bitter sweat, I stumbled on the stair.
I tried to cry; my throat was dry; I sought to grip his arm;
For well I knew this man I slew was there to do us harm.
Lo! he was walking by my side, his fingers clutched my own,
This man I knew so well had died, his hand was naked bone.
His face was like a skull, his eyes were caverns of decay . . .
And so we came to the crystal frame where lonely Lenin lay.

Without a sound we shuffled round> I sought to make a sign,
But like a vice his hand of ice was biting into mine.
With leaden pace around the place where Lenin lies at rest,
We slouched, I saw his bony claw go fumbling to his breast.
With ghastly grin he groped within, and tore his robe apart,
And from the hollow of his ribs he drew his blackened heart. . . .
Ah no! Oh God! A bomb, a BOMB! And as I shrieked with dread,
With fiendish cry he raised it high, and . . . swung at Lenin's head.
Oh I was blinded by the flash and deafened by the roar,
And in a mess of bloody mash I wallowed on the floor.
Then Alps of darkness on me fell, and when I saw again
The leprous light 'twas in a cell, and I was racked with pain;
And ringèd around by shapes of gloom, who hoped that I would die;
For of the crowd that crammed the Tomb the sole to live was I.
They told me I had dreamed a dream that must not be revealed,
But by their eyes of evil gleam I knew my doom was sealed.

I need not tell how from my cell in Lubianka gaol,
I broke away, but listen, here's the point of all my tale. . . .
Outside the "Gay Pay Oo" none knew of that grim scene of gore;
They closed the Tomb, and then they threw it open as before.
And there was Lenin, stiff and still, a symbol and a sign,
And rancid races come to thrill and wonder at his Shrine;
And hold the thought: if Lenin rot the Soviets will decay;
And there he sleeps and calm he keeps his watch and ward for aye.
Yet if you pass that frame of glass, peer closely at his phiz,
So stern and firm it mocks the worm, it looks like wax . . . and is.
They tell you he's a mummy - don't you make that bright mistake:
I tell you - he's a dummy; aye, a fiction and a fake.
This eye beheld the bloody bomb that bashed him on the bean.
I heard the crash, I saw the flash, yet . . . there he lies serene.
And by the roar that rocked the Tomb I ask: how could that be?
But if you doubt that deed of doom, just go yourself and see.
You think I'm mad, or drunk, or both . . . Well, I don't care a damn:
I tell you this: their Lenin is a waxen, show-case SHAM.

Such was the yarn he handed me,
Down there in Casey's Bar,
That Rooshun bug with the scrambled mug
From the land of the Commissar.
It may be true, I leave it you
To figger out how far.




--- Robert Service

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

Less than if
Is more than but
Something equals
Why times not
Big is more
Than small is less
And yes is nothing
Not, I guess

[CSM]

"You CAN find points that you agree with her on and not "lose your soul"!"

I wholeheartidly agree and I am probably a great example of your point. I can never understand the "all or nothing" attitude towards Ayn. Just to brag, I own an original printing of "Atlas Shrugged" and then a signed limited edition reprint......

[DoctorMichael]

Preface: I have the utmost respect for Rand, Buckley and Chambers; each, for their own attributes and deeds.

That said, Chambers, befriended by Buckley, was employed as a reviewer (a 'foil') during this timeperiod to trash Rand's writings.

Just a little background: Chamber's review of Atlas Shrugged was particularly scathing and contained allusions to Ayn Rand (an Atheist Jew) giving orders (ie. if you followed her philosophy) to march 'to the ovens'. Needless to say egos were quite bruised on all sides from the various actions by the particulars.

There was a lot of intellectual infighting for the direction in which the nascent Conservative Movement should go at the time. I'm just putting the essay in context.

[Lurker]

The movie will be on Turner Classic Movies this week. Watch or Tivo it to find out why Howard Roarke destroyed the building.

L

[theFIRMbss]

>Well we can ALL see The FOUNTAINHEAD movie on Turner Classic Movies tomorrow night

The Atlas Shrugged-types
in charge of the electric
power for my suburb

have some lines down and
expect it will be two days
or more [!] of blackout.

I won't be watching
anything on the TV.
[shrugs] Who is John Galt?

[Rembrandt_fan]

Heinlein was just peeved because he felt his literary merit was unrecognized by the mainstream critics of his day. Insofar as critics are concerned, no one can say the great art critic, John Ruskin, for example, was an uncreative man. His critical essays constitute some of the finest, most perceptive writing in the English language. And it was Ruskin, too, who recognized the painter J.W.W. Turner's greatness, and told the world about it.

Chambers was on solid intellectual ground in his 'Atlas Shrugged' review. Attempting to diminish all critics and criticism is a broadside hitting nothing. There are bad critics, certainly--art critic Robert Hughes comes immediately to mind--but if one puts work out there and expects it to be taken seriously, then expect serious people to look at it.

[theFIRMbss]

>The Atlas Shrugged-types in charge of the electric power for my suburb have some lines down and expect it will be two days or more [!] of blackout...


I apologize
to the ComEd types. They got
our power back on

a day and a half
ahead of schedule. (They worked
in a cold rain, too!)

[x]

I thought the argument went more the other way -- that she was a lousy novelist because her fictional works were political tracts -- but I guess it works your way as well.

There's an opposition between philosophy. Fiction deals with particulars, and philosophy with universals. That is to say, philosophy aspires to discover the general and binding laws of existence, but fiction can only deal with what are more or less individual exceptions. The closer it comes to giving us living, concrete human characters the better it is. Philosophy, on the other hand, aims at abstraction and generality.

A great philosophical novelist like Tolstoy or Dostoevsky or Mann is great for being more than an ideologue and dogmatic thinker, though as he aged, Tolstoy certainly tried to be more a doctrinaire and dogmatist than a creative writer. So I think one can make the case that Rand should have chose one path or the other.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Who write the dramatic critiques for the second-rate papers?
Why, a parcel of promoted shoemakers and apprentice apothecaries, who know just as much about good acting as I do about good farming and no more. Who review the books?
People who never wrote one.
Who do up the heavy leaders on finance? Parties who have had the largest opportunities for knowing nothing about it. Who criticise the Indian campaigns?
Gentlemen who do not know a war-whoop from a wigwam, and who never have had to run a foot race with a tomahawk, or pluck arrows out of the several members of their families to build the evening camp-fire with.
Who write the temperance appeals, and clamor about the flowing bowl? Folks who will never draw another sober breath till they do it in the grave.

Mark Twain

---

Mark Twain, Ayn Rand and Robert Heinlein are my three favorites, Followed by Robert Service.

[Rob Larrikin]

The basis of his accusation that Rand was a fascist dictator in waiting ultimately was simply that ALL atheists are ultimately fascist. He slightly camouflaged such a ridiculous statement by using the word "materialist" rather than simply atheist, which is what he meant.
The point of this was the weak old theistic warhorse that some God is supposedly the only possible source of morals or values.
Al Barger quote ( by tpaine).

I am an atheist... and that is the gaping 40mm cannon hole in Ayn Rand's philosophy...
Sir Francis Dashwood

You are the exception, and this is your gaping cannon hole.  Rand didn't say 'all' or 'always', as you infer.  She was talking about 'most', and that applied even more so in her day.

[Rob Larrikin]

I thought the argument went more the other way -- that she was a lousy novelist because her fictional works were political tracts -- but I guess it works your way as well.

I wouldn't describe her novels as lousy.  You have to also remember that fashion and style play and important role in one's judgment.  How many fictions do you like from 1957? Styles change, and word usage changes.  Many feminists today think Rand was a feminist, as a result of her use of ‘men', ‘man' and ‘mankind'.  In her day this meant men and women.  Today's feminists think she was simply attacking men…  There are many other misunderstandings too.  For instance, libertarians often misinterpret her use of the word ‘strike'.  Then there are many out-of-fashion terms, expressions and so on.  A woman swooning at a heroic man is old fashioned today, but common in '57.  Today's big screen heroine has the muscle.  She beats up the villains, while some poor runt of a man swoons.

So it's no wonder you think her novels are lousy.  I take history, style and fashion into consideration when reading Rand.  The political part of her books is timeless, and applicable anywhere.  I wouldn't give her grief over fashion when her political philosophy is so balls on accurate.

There's an opposition between philosophy. Fiction deals with particulars, and philosophy with universals. That is to say, philosophy aspires to discover the general and binding laws of existence, but fiction can only deal with what are more or less individual exceptions. The closer it comes to giving us living, concrete human characters the better it is. Philosophy, on the other hand, aims at abstraction and generality. A great philosophical novelist like Tolstoy or Dostoevsky or Mann is great for being more than an ideologue and dogmatic thinker, though as he aged, Tolstoy certainly tried to be more a doctrinaire and dogmatist than a creative writer. So I think one can make the case that Rand should have chose one path or the other.

You're forgetting newness.  When new ideas are presented to jingoistic, Statist bigots, they stand little chance of a warm reception.  The mob sweeps good ideas away without a glance.  Presenting them in a boring, stuffy way only increases this rejection.  They stand a greater chance of being seen and understood, if they are presented in an interesting way.  Fiction makes this possible.

To most socialists, Rand was speaking an alien language.  When learning a language, you need stories – i.e. interesting examples.

 

 

[Rembrandt_fan]

I agree with you on Twain. The more you read him, the deeper and more satisfying it gets. My point still stands, though: agree with their judgment or not, good critics are worth their weight in gold, and they do matter.

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

Rand didn't say 'all' or 'always', as you infer.

I inferred no such thing, you attributed to me something someone else quoted...

Morality and all of its associated ideals are rooted entirely in the presupposition some higher power defines what is correct in human behavior.

You can test this with logic and it proves true every time.

That is the gaping 40mm cannon hole in Ayn Rand's philosophy...

An atheist who claims someone is immoral is no different than any preacher or rabbi saying they are a sinner...

Again, it is illustrated by Socrates in Plato's Euthyphro. (You cannot be pious to the gods if the gods all want different things.)

Such is the same for the esoteric hobgoblins of morality, because like the pagan pantheons of gods, they are idols constructed by human beings.

[Rob Larrikin]

'"Rand didn't say 'all' or 'always', as you infer."
I inferred no such thing, you attributed to me something someone else quoted...'

I responded to your post, in which you said, “I am an atheist... and that is the gaping 40mm cannon hole in Ayn Rand's philosophy...”
If that was not your quote you should have named the writer or placed his quote in quote marks.

Whether it was you or someone else, my response was and still is, “Rand didn't say 'all' or 'always', as you infer.”

The inference is that when Rand says, “X people are Y, she means ALL X people are Y.”

She didn’t mean that.