Pets in Rand's Novels
This has been an idle thought that has been resurfacing in my mind for the last few days, and please excuse my errors. I'll learn.
Why are Rand's novels conspicuously devoid of animals/pets? The only instance I remember is Gail Wynard's kitten in Atlas Shrugged, which was mentioned only once, and fleetingly at that.
Was Rand making a philosophical point about animals? She may not have viewed them as worthwhile because they aren't intellectually stimulating for the heroes. Was it a personal preference? I haven't done any research, but maybe she just didn't like animals.
I've been writing an essay for the Fountainhead essay contest, and I wrote: "[Authors] must be selective in picking events that are ideologically significant to their theme." I personally believe that if one of the heroes had a pet, it would be insignificant to the idea of independence and rationality Rand was trying to create.
Or, to think of it differently, what was significant about Wynard's kitten that made it worth mentioning?
So, what say you?
Why are Rand's novels conspicuously devoid of animals/pets? The only instance I remember is Gail Wynard's kitten in Atlas Shrugged, which was mentioned only once, and fleetingly at that.
Was Rand making a philosophical point about animals? She may not have viewed them as worthwhile because they aren't intellectually stimulating for the heroes. Was it a personal preference? I haven't done any research, but maybe she just didn't like animals.
I've been writing an essay for the Fountainhead essay contest, and I wrote: "[Authors] must be selective in picking events that are ideologically significant to their theme." I personally believe that if one of the heroes had a pet, it would be insignificant to the idea of independence and rationality Rand was trying to create.
Or, to think of it differently, what was significant about Wynard's kitten that made it worth mentioning?
So, what say you?
love cats. Also, there is a cat mentioned in We, the Living. But I am thinking that in cases of peop-
le's struggling a lot (as some of her heroes did), per-
haps they just didn't think they could afford pets. I think perhaps she regarded it as a marginal is-
sue. She did mention somewhere, I think it was
in an off-the-cuff answer, that animals, being
living creatures, did have a "certain value", in-
cluding as "surrogate friends".
Hammetts pooch, the thin mans pet, Myrna's dog.
Dogs' predecessors were pack animals. So were humans'. Many humans still are. There are no dog democratic socialists following Bernie Sanders. How a dog turns out depends on the characteristics of the breed, the immediate parentage, and how you work with it from the beginning of its development.
Only a few breeds of dogs excel at herding, which is one kind of productive work, not enforcing. Intelligent dogs, including those originally bred for herding, have a natural inclination to be active in thinking and goal seeking, though they don't think in concepts.
Common advice for owners of border collies is to make sure the dog has something to do or it will find something which you probably won't like. Some people don't want to have a border collie as a pet because they don't want a pet smarter than they are. Border collies are not only actively intelligent, taking in everything around them with amazing focus, they can be loving pets and individual companions who interact with their owners better than a lot of people do.
An interesting account of the accomplishments of one border collie and her psychologist owner who worked with her is Chaser: Unlocking the Genius of the Dog Who Knows a Thousand Words https://www.amazon.com/Chaser-Unlocki...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi8HF...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTTui...
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-smart...
https://www.youtube.com/user/pilleyjw
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