Posted on 02/09/2008 7:48:30 PM PST by mpackard
I dont think that I've done a vanity before so, forgive me. The last 3 books that I've read, in this order, are We the Living-Ayn Rand, the Fountainhead-Ayn Rand and then, tonight, Tuesdays with Morrie-Mitch Albom. I'm actually just wondering.....is there something wrong with me? Does Morrie Schwartz remind anyone else of Elsworth Toohey? I'm just wondering???? The altruist against the egoist? I found myself feeling contemp for this supposedly selfless man who I actually found to be full of himself. Am I ruined?
Maybe yes, because I don’t know what you are talking about.
Better get some better reading material.
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Ruined? Nah, I think not. I have not read any of the three of these books, but I probably will eventually - once I work my way down through the big stack of books I already have to read. I have found that people are as widely varied (if not more so) as the books you can choose. Variety being the spice of life, it is not a bad thing to “mix it up” a bit, and select from widely disparate sources because it forces you to look at and wrestle with different things. Just my 2 cents...
Perhaps, since I was ELATED to see my philosophy put into words as I read Rand. All of them.
Haven’t read “Tuesdays with Morrie”. However, Ellsworth Toohey is perhaps the most evil character in literature. His evil is not the overt kind of a Hitler or Stalin, rather it is a like a subtle anestesia that puts the victime to sleep by killing their soul. Ayn Rand out did herself by brilliantly personifying the evils of socialism.
I’ve only read the Rand books, NOT the Albom one.....VERY different books, however. I’ve perused the Albom one. I can see why you feel the way you do.
I’ve never done a vanity. (Unless I was drunk and don’t remember.)
Recommendations? I read Atlas Shrugged last year and finished the Fountainhead just last week.
The old dying man says something like “I went to the funeral of my friend and it was such a waste. He couldn’t hear all the great things said about him”. So how does this guy know that? He doesn’t.
I read two books once that struck me in a similar way. I read THE BELL JAR about a spoiled brat who attempts suicide and eventually the author really commits suicide. I read Bell Jar right after reading CANCER WARD by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. On one level CANCER WARD is about hospitals in the old USSR (in this case Tashkent), on a deeper level it is about the USSR, and on a still deeper level it is about life and the love of life. Its characters have little but desperately love life and want to live while in the BELL JAR the young woman has so much but wants to end her life. Guess which book gets the most reprints and is assigned in the most classes at American universities.
Couldn’t tell you, because I’ll never read anything by mitch albom.
Make sure you read the last two Rand books... Atlas Shrugged and Anthem. Anthem is my personal favorite.
Atlas Shrugged was the best book that I’ve ever read ( I read it last year) and I read Anthem around Thanksgiving. I liked it but not in the way that I liked the rest of them. I only picked up Morrie because my daughter brought it in and said this will make you cry. She has the other 2 but I dont think that I’ll be wasting 2 more hours of my day to read them. I was suckered into watching “One more Day” a few months ago. It was okay but it certainly wasn’t life changing.
not JUST socialism. I believe that what struck me the most was the way that he (Toohey) made mediocrity famous and virtuous. I find it so hard to put into words how frighteningly timely that concept is today.
Thank you, I’ll read Cancer Ward but I think that I’ll just leave Bell Jar alone. See, I can hardly muster the sympathy.
You can be 'selfless' and an egoist at the same time. As a matter of fact, it is almost a guarantee.
When you think it thru, I wonder if anyone of us has really done ANYTHING out of pure selflessness, from donating to church or charity to caring for our kids. Pure selflessness, I would guess, is as rare a commodity as any.
true.....
Nah. You’re not ruined. “Tuesdays with Morrie” sucked. Shallow, stupid and pointless. I didn’t shed a tear, in fact, the author’s brazen attempt at manipulation made me mad. With all the hype, I kept reading to the end. I’ll not make the same mistake again.
Life is too short to read bad books.
You should read “Harrison Bergeron”—short story by Kurt Vonnegut. It deals with a future where everyone is reduced to the lowest common demonominator in the name of equality.
Who is John Galt?
sorry, couldn’t resist
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