Posted on 02/21/2009 8:12:02 AM PST by Publius
Unfortunately for the artist, the ultimate patron of the arts is time. In the past, artists had to win patrons. There were some people who knew good stuff when they saw it and others who simply had money and no taste. Now I sit here listening to Mozart, next to a poster of my favorite Van Gogh painting because time kept their work alive. There were probably plenty of not-so-good artists who were popular in eras past, but not good enough to the long haul.
Government sponsorship of art has damaged good art because government has an agenda and everything must be filtered through it. 100 years from now, I can't imagine that anyone will spend a chilly afternoon listening to a symphony inspired by AIDS sufferers next to a poster of the piss Christ. But I bet ol' Mozart and VVG will still be around.
The product of industry has a much shorter path to success than art. A great product can make a near immediate impact on the world. And the government can screw that up just as quickly.
In this chapter, we end up just as baffled over Lillian as Hank was - what does she want? What is she after? I agree that she really does seem to hate her husband. Yet all these people at the party are mostly her friends and she is receiving attention and admiration from her most trendy group of guests.
I avoid people like the “party guests” like the plague.
I have to work with a few of them and have a few in my family.
I cannot hold my tongue do I do my level best to avoid hearing their conversation or engaging them.
If I hear someone spilling a load of BS I call it. I also don't have a problem saying “That's a lie’, or “you obviously don't have a clue what you are talking about”.
I'd probably be shunned if I cared enough to notice. I'm not exactly anti social but my social skills don't allow me to slide in b/s without commenting on it.
I suffered with Reardon as he went through this. I'd have been throwing people out of my house.
You sound a bit like Dagny. She was quite cheerful when she volunteered to slap Bertram Scudder.
I’m about 10 inches too short.
I suffered with Reardon as he went through this. I'd have been throwing people out of my house.
If this group met at Rearden's Mill, I have no doubt that would have occurred. The house appears to be Lillian's. Rearden seem to want to keep his marriage intact but Lillian has done everything she could to make the evening uncomfortable.
I can understand wanting to keep the peace in his marriage.
Hank is all confused emotionally. He has allowed himself to be brainwashed.
He is a willing host to a bunch of leeches.
Leeches can't suck you dry unless you let them.
One of the leftist phrases that I actually approve of is “speaking truth” to power but I call it “speaking truth is power”.
This would have been an excellent working title for Atlas Shrugged!
Thanks.
Exquisite and to the point. May I honor your statement by using it as my tagline for a while?
Sure.
can you add me as well to this list?
Jenny
Please add me also. I ordered my book from Amazon last week.
Ping to Post #2 that has all the links.
I did a search on google for Ayn Rand a few weeks ago and there was one picture I remember seeing of her face when she was a young woman and I thought she was quite beautiful in it. Some women don’t age well and she didn’t fair very well in that regard.
I had jury duty today, so I dragged out my ancient paperback copy of Atlas Shrugged. I’m pretty much caught up with the group now.
Believe it or not, I have this copy because in 1980, I took an Econ 101 class at the University of Hawaii at Hilo, and AS was assigned by the professor. His class was my introduction to free market economics.
Boy, is that type small, though! I didn’t care when I was 19, but now at 47, I practically need a jeweler’s loupe to read it.
Please add me to the ping. Thanks!
It's now time to increase the priority of bringing Atlas Shrugged to the big screen. In listening to Rush Limbaugh's diatribes, I think he is perfect to play the John Galt character.
I'd like to see a series of political cartoons illustrating how private businesses and entrepeneurs represent the engine of the economy (such as a train engine), with the engine pulling a few passenger cars partially filled with passengers as in a few years ago, and the times today showing thousands of individuals jumping onto the train and the engine bogging down because it can't support the load. Another, where it's a ferry boat, and thousands of individuals jumping onto the boat at the dock, causing it to sink.
That's what's really happening. In my opinion, those who don't acknowledge it are either really ignorant or they must have an agenda to actually make it happen.
Here's what Nikita Khrushchev said: I once said, "We will bury you," and I got into trouble with it. Of course we will not bury you with a shovel. Your own working class will bury you.
We're well on the way to fulfilling Khrushchev's prophecy.
Rearden considers himself to be guilt-ridden because of his commitment to Lillian, so it is a self-imposed torture that he is playing out. He is definitely in love with Dagny, but he has exiled himself because he continues to assume his place of guilt under the looters' standards.
Uneasy how she seems to be Obama's scriptwriter. It's like when he looks into the teleprompter he channels Wesley Mouch.
And even Rand couldn't come up with a Pelosi!
Her athiesm was very kneejerk...if she could have understood faith on some level, she would have been a better writer. You couldn't do a good satire of a Pelosi without some rudimentary Christianity to see what a true monster Pelosi is...
ping
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