Return of the Primitive, Ayn Rand and Peter Schwartz
Return of the Primitive, Ayn Rand and Peter Schwartz
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Return of the Primitive
The AntiIndustrial Revolution

Author: Ayn Rand and Peter Schwartz

Narrator: Bernadette Dunne

Unabridged: 13 hr 10 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 11/25/2009

Categories: Nonfiction, Philosophy


Synopsis

In the 1960s and early 70s, the most prominent, vocal cultural movement was the New Left: a movement that condemned America and everything it stood for: individualism, material wealth, science, technology, capitalism. While the New Left achieved limited political success, it brought about vast cultural changes that remain with us to this day. The reason is that while its representatives faced some political opposition, they faced littletono fundamental intellectual opposition. Ayn Rand was the exception. In her essays from this period, anthologized in The New Left: The AntiIndustrial Revolution, she opposed the New Left as no one else did. The audience of the book, she wrote, is all those who are concerned about college students and about the state of modern education and who are seeking a voice of reason to turn to. In her essays, AynRand identified the essential evils of the New Left and their cause. Where most viewed the New Left and its violent college protests, its worship of untouched nature, and its orgiastic mob celebrations as some sort of inexplicable, youthful rebellion against the establishment, AynRand identified that these rebels were in fact dutiful, consistent practitioners of the ideas taught to them by their teachers. Return of the Primitive is an expanded edition of The New Left. It features the entire contents of the original edition authorized by AynRand, plus two of her other essays, Racism and Global Balkanization, which are highly relevant to todays campuses and world. Additionally, it features three essays written after her death by Peter Schwartz, analyzing some of the ideologies that the New Left helped spawn, such as multiculturalism and environmentalism.For those who seek to understand the state of American culture today, Return of the Primitive is required reading.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Mike on April 02, 2018

Rand has some solid critiques of post-modernism and the far-left, and her ideas are highly relevant, especially in today’s climate. However, I found her style very dramatic and unbalanced. She’s quite comfortable attributing the most malice of intents to differing ideological groups, leaving no room......more

Goodreads review by Nathan on February 07, 2014

This was probably the Ayn Rand book that I agreed with the least. I know many environmentalists, and although a small number do want to send us all back to the stone age, most merely want to prevent the destruction of a planet that they love. As for myself, my prime motive is to save the human race.......more

Goodreads review by Robert on August 31, 2017

Shockingly relevant to the culture turmoil of the 21st century, scary that most of the essays were written decades ago.......more