My daughter is only 6 and I'm already talking to her about Ayn Rand hoping it sinks in early and to help De - program the liberal philosophy taught in public schools. Can't wait for her reading level to advance enough to comprehend Rands work.

Even if the teacher's planning to trash Rand, *just reading the books is good*. If I had the undesirable choice of my kids taking a class that ignored Rand or had them read it but was critical of it, I'd rather have them read it. Hopefully they'll read it anyway, but I truly believe Ayn Rand's books can stand up to criticism. Even if teenagers read them and learns how supposedly evil they are, the teenagers will grow up and see the truth all around them in just a few years.

I'm intrigued by the "why" on this....

Do they not see it as a singularly strong warning against collectivism/socialism?
Since that is the ideal society to the government and by extension government schools one would think they would assign reading that portrays it positively rather than negatively.

My older daughter read Anthem for her AP English class a couple of years ago. After that, she asked to read AS, mostly because she liked the movies.

well, she'll enjoy it. discussing the book before next semester will give her a chance to sharpen arguments she may need. there's something so compelling about smart, beautiful young women (and handsome young men) who get it!

I greatly enjoyed that book. Greatly.

Some of the statements about individualism/selfishness seem stark in this book and could be abused if the teacher so chose; however, the first thing the main character plans to do at the end of the book is free more of like minded people from the collective and build a new community and his motives for doing so seem to be that he wants others to be happy like himself--hardly a selfish concern.

Wow.

You should know: "Anthem" was my intro to Ayn Rand. A hole-in-the-wall book shop in New Haven, Conn., put it on the Science Fiction shelves. I bought it, read it, and went to the Yale University Bookstore (then known as the Yale Co-operative Corporation Store) and bought a copy of every novel and essay collection Rand ever had published.

I am a non-”producer” and an infrequent contributor here because I generally doubt the value of this kind of discourse (and I do value my dollars). I, too, use Anthem as in introduction to objectivism. I just do it with the knowledge that the novel’s logic is flawed. Rand had little understanding of technology or science. If I were a socialist, I would take full advantage of that by pointing out that the "outside" in Anthem would degrade into uselessness within a matter of years, not decades. I would then point out that there is nowhere “outside” to go. And yet you need an escape to survive as an objectivist (a non-socialist). Is that not a logical contradiction, almost like a proof in mathematics?

this is a good thing, don't misunderstand me. some Rand is better than no Rand.
But Anthem? They should have read it in their Honors Middle School English Class.
"Honors" classes, especially summer ones, used to be grueling, satisfying WORK.
They should be reading Fountainhead. and discussing 3-on-1 with the teacher, so he knows who's gotten what.

oh, let the building fall down and sow salt in the ruins and I'll sit under a tree with a couple of kids and read what they need to read next.

This makes me sad, because I had to read Anthem in high school and thought it was really boring and artsy. Any other of Rand's fiction is much more gripping.

"The 'outside' [in 'Anthem"]would degrade into
uselessness"? Does LWinn mean Equality's and
his Golden One's and the friends he intends to
recruit would degrade into uselessness? It's not
necessary, or even likely. As to his hometown, it
has already degraded into uselessness, and is
pretty well hopeless.

Amen.

Sorry for not posting this sooner, Petri, but my first reaction was to warn your daughter to scope out the environment carefully. If the teacher's views are anti-Randian or Socialist or whatever, there's a good chance that merely disagreeing with or questioning the teacher's comments or suggestions will earn an Instant F in the class.

There have been too many reports of that shit happening at schools. If the teacher is, in fact, trying to 'mind-fuck' the students, suggest that she parrot back what the teacher wants to hear, collect the good grades for her record, and go back to thinking when the class is over.

just MY two cents... after taxes.
:)