Provides in-depth analysis of the life, works, career, and critical importance of Ayn Rand.

Portrait of one of the most significant and improbable figures of the twentieth century--from her childhood in Russia during the Bolshevik Revolution to her years as a screenwriter in Hollywood, the publication of her blockbuster novels, and the rise and fall of the cult that formed around her in the 1950s and 1960s.

After twelve years of suffering mysterious disappearances of society's most-productive individuals, the nation's economy is on the verge of collapse. As the government pursues policies imposing even greater brutality against those remaining, Dagny Taggart, Vice President of Taggart Transcontinental, must make a choice between saving the nation's collapsing infrestructure or the man she has come to love - the man who would stop the motor of the World....

"After writing a satirical novel that The New York Times calls classist, Anna is shunned by the literary establishment and, in her hurt, radicalized by the philosophy of Ayn Rand. Determined to follow Rand's theory of rational selfishness, Anna alienates herself from the scene and eventually her friends and family. Finally, in true Randian style, she abandons everyone for the boundless horizons of Los Angeles, hoping to make a TV show about her beloved...