Ayn Rand's Letters of Ayn Rand

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Quotations *The best manner of presenting nothing still makes it remain nothing. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Kenneth MacGowan (film producer and director), May 18, 1934 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *I believe that man will always be an individualist, whether he knows it or not, and I want to make it my duty to make him know it. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to H. L. Mencken, July 28, 1934 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *[A]ny form of swift physical annihilation is preferable to the inconceivable horror of a living death. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Temple Graves (newspaper columnist), July 5, 1936 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *All the crimes of history have always been perpetrated by the mob. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Temple Graves (newspaper columnist), July 5, 1936 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *You cannot claim that you have a healthy forest composed of rotting trees. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Temple Graves (newspaper columnist), August 12, 1936 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *If we have a society where everyone sacrifices---just exactly who profits and who is happy? -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Temple Graves (newspaper columnist), August 12, 1936 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Do I have to tell you that I love you? -Ayn Rand Private correspondence Frank O'Connor (her husband), August 19, 1936 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 1, "Arrival in America to We the Living (1926-1937)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *It is only the completely mediocre writer who never entertains any doubts on the value of his work. The man of talent is always more severe with his own writing than any outside critic could ever be. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Channing Pollock (drama critic, author, and playwright), June 8, 1941 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *I am having a grand time here [in Ridgefield, Conn., visiting Isabel Paterson]. . .I'm turning into a humanitarian and loving the world. That's a natural result of doing nothing but loafing. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Archibald Ogden (her editor for The Fountainhead, and later friend), May 6, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *If you mean "faith" in a religious sense---in the sense of blind acceptance---I don't have any faith in anything or anybody, I never have had and never will have. I go by facts and reason. I had neither faith nor nonfaith when I first met you. I formed no opinion of you until I had some concrete evidence on which to base an opinion. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Archibald Ogden (her editor for The Fountainhead, and later friend), May 6, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Man's first duty is not to others, but to himself. He can survive only through the function of his reasoning mind directed toward the conquest of nature. Which means---his productive work. This is his primary concern. His creative capacity is his highest virtue. But we have been taught that the highest virtue is to give, not to achieve. Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before distribution---or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary. The creator stands above any humanitarian. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Tom Girdler (founder of Republic Steel and Vultee Aircraft), July 12, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *There is no hope for the world unless and until we formulate, accept and state publicly a true moral code of individualism, based on man's inalienable right to live for himself. Neither to hurt nor to serve his brothers, but to be independent of them in his function and in his motive. Neither to sacrifice them for himself nor to sacrifice himself for them in selfless service---but to deal with them in free exchange among equals, each with a legitimate right to his own benefit, and not in the spirit of any kind of altruistic service of anyone by anyone. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Tom Girdler (founder of Republic Steel and Vultee Aircraft), July 12, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Contrary to the vulgar belief that men are motivated primarily by materialistic considerations, we now see the capitalist system being discredited and destroyed all over the world, even though this system has given men the greatest material comforts and benefits ever achieved on earth. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Archibald Ogden (her editor for The Fountainhead, and later friend), August 16, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *[If a man considers the connection between philosophy and reality], [h]e might discover that true philosophy is derived from reality, and that our actions must be governed by abstract philosophical principles whenever we act as human beings and expect to achieve any rational goal. Or where does he think philosophy comes from---and how does he propose to act in practical reality without conception of whether he is acting on the right or wrong principle?. . . Does he conduct chemical research by ignoring or directly opposing the laws of nature? If a philosophy is inapplicable to reality, it is simply not a philosophy. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Ruth Alexander (a conservative writer), October 22, 1943 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 2, "We The Living to The Fountainhead (1937-1943)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Don't let yourself fall for that awful nonsense of Karl Marx about economics determining human nature. They don't. Neither in general historical events---nor in specific human instances. Economic position affects only the form, the surface details of a person---his clothes, his grammar, his manners. NOT his essence as a human being. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Gerald Loeb (vice president of E. F. Hutton and Co.), August 5, 1944 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 4, "Return to Hollywood" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *A good quotation must be a complete entity. It must be like a headline---sharp, clear, whole. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Leonard Read (founder of the Foundation for Economic Education), November 12, 1944 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 4, "Return to Hollywood" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *You may tell the Du Ponts that they and I have something in common: I deal in explosives, too. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), August 28, 1945 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *I can never learn anything unless I grasp the basic abstraction involved. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), February 7, 1948 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The most thrilling moment was when the engine started moving, and the ride through the underground tunnel out of Grand Central. Everything I thought of as heroic about man's technological achievements was there concretely for me to feel for the first time in my life. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), February 7, 1948 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The nature of a being endowed with free will is that he is capable of both good and evil and must make the choice. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), May 8, 1948 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The idea of Original Sin simply damns man for the fact of possessing free will. Apparently he was perfect before the fall, because he was a moral robot, and became evil by acquiring the faculty of moral choice. That depraved notion is simply the condemnation of free will as an evil. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), May 8, 1948 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *[Y]ou say. . ."Can you indict such a considerably number of the human race, including some of the greatest minds the human race has exhibited, without certain implications as to the human race itself?" Why, yes, I certainly can. It is possible that the entire human race, with the exception of me, might become collectivist---and I will then damn the whole bunch of them, without damning man as such. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Isabel Paterson (author of The God of the Machine, and a friend), May 8, 1948 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 5, "Letters to Isabel Paterson" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *But of all writers on earth I'm the worst one to pick for an article aimed at women from the angle of women. I just ain't that kind of writer. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to T. A. Robertson (from King Features Syndicate), January 7,1945 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Don't ever believe the stories about authors putting people into novels. That idea is a kind of joke on both authors and readers. All the readers believe that authors do it. All the authors know that it can't be done. What an author actually does is this: he observes real life, deduces the abstract principles behind certain actions or characters, and then creates his own characters out of the abstraction. The resemblance to real people is one of principle---not of literal, personal copying. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Gerald James (a fan), August 18,1945 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The method of romantic realism is to make life more beautiful and interesting than it actually is, yet give it all the reality, and even a more convincing reality than that of our everyday existence. Life, not as it is, but as it could be and should be. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Henry Blanke (producer of The Fountainhead movie), December 6,1945 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The economic benefits which the whole society, including the poor, does receive from capitalism come about strictly as secondary consequences, (which is the only way any social result can come about), not as primary goals. The primary goal which makes the system work is the personal, private, individual profit motive. When that motive is declared to be immoral, the whole system becomes immoral, and the motor of the system stops dead. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Leonard Read (founder of the Foundation for Economic Education), February 28,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *[E]conomics have the same place in relation to the whole of society's life as economic problems have in the life of a single individual. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Leonard Read (founder of the Foundation for Economic Education), February 28,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *An opinion is only important when expressed in action. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Alan Collins (her literary agent at Curtis Brown, Ltd.), June 24,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Facts per se are meaningless, unless we draw conclusions from them and learn something. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Burt MacBride (senior editor at Reader's Digest), July 30, 1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *I think it is the essence of human life that death should be no part of it, and by definition it isn't. When you die, you stop living. I am concerned only with the living. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Robert Bremer (a fan), November 2,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945- 1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *There is only one great debt that men owe to others---and it's not a material one (though its results are material). The only real benefit we receive from others is the benefit of the accumulated thinking of the men who preceded us, or of our own contemporaries who have superior intelligence. If I were born alone on a desert island, I could work as hard as I do now, with the same ability---and I would not achieve a material return equivalent to the one I get now. It is the accumulated thought, knowledge and discoveries of the past that make my efforts produce more (materially) than if I were starting alone from scratch and had to spend my life inventing the wheel (if I were even able to invent it). The fact that billions of human beings are working at something and producing something around me does not actually add to my material welfare. What they produce, they keep to themselves--- or, to be exact, they keep its material equivalent, in the process of exchange. The something extra I get from men, the thing that raises the material efficiency of my own efforts is not the anonymous hordes of the "common man." It's the thinking, the ingenuity of the exceptional men who discovered and showed me better ways of doing things, which I would not have discovered by myself. The great advantages of an exchange society---of a division of labor and specialization---were made possible only by these thinkers and discoverers. Now the degree to which I profit from this accumulated intelligence depends upon my own intelligence, upon my ability to understand great thinking, to grasp it and apply it. If my ability is great---then to carry it forward. If my ability is of the lowest order--- then I still get a benefit from the intelligence around me, only in this case almost totally undeserved, completely "extra." -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Rose Wilder Lane (pro-individualist writer and daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder), November 3,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Human actions proceed from intellectual premises, accepted consciously as convictions or on faith, as axioms. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Rose Wilder Lane (pro-individualist writer and daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder), November 3,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Every moral duty you owe to yourself requires a positive action; everything you owe your neighbor is negative---to abstain from action that would infringe his rights. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Rose Wilder Lane (pro-individualist writer and daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder), November 3,1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Every moral precept amounts, in effect, to: This is what you should do because it is good and proper for a man to do so but you have the possibility, the choice, to do otherwise. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Rose Wilder Lane (pro-individualist writer and daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder), December, 1946 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The most dangerous thing in the world is a definition which is not specific, not objective, but open to the arbitrary interpretation of anyone who wishes to use it. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence Linda Lynneberg (a friend), April 17,1947 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Do you call the fact that my book benefited readers "altruistic"? Do you mean that they deprived from it greater benefits than I did, spiritual or material? Do you mean that their benefit was achieved at the expense of mine or at the price of some sort of self-sacrifice by me? Do you mean that I wrote it for their sake, not mine? Do you mean that I wrote it for the purpose of benefiting them, with no personal interest involved in the matter? or do you mean that in order to be selfish, I had to expect my book to harm people---but since it didn't, this makes me an altruist? -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Robert Spencer Carr (science fiction author), January 23,1949 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *A good story is like a beautiful body. A beautiful body is beautiful to any audience in any day, age or century; the only thing that changes is the fashion in clothing. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Henry Blanke (producer for The Fountainhead movie), February 26,1949 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 6, "The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged Years (1945-1959)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *In any group of men, those who formulate basic principles will direct those who don't, and will determine the practical policy of the group. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to Barry Goldwater (U.S. Senator), June 4,1960 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 8, "The Later Years (1960-1981)" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Since I reject the basic premises of the Bible and of Christianity as untenable, I do not consider it incumbent upon me to discuss or refute (or even to study) the particular interpretation of every one of the three-hundred-some sects. And if I were to discuss the issue with a philosophically-minded Christian, it is the basic premises that I would discuss. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Hospers (academic philosopher), January 3,1961 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 7, "Letters to a Philosopher" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *The purpose of the law is not to prevent a future offense, but to punish the one actually committed. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Hospers (academic philosopher), April 29, 1961 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 7, "Letters to a Philosopher" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *All political systems and theories are based on and derived from some ethical theory; the laws of a society reflect its dominant moral code. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Hospers (academic philosopher), April 29,1961 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 7, "Letters to a Philosopher" Michael S. Berliner, ed. *Every code of morality is based on and derived from a metaphysics, that is: from a certain view of the nature of the universe in which man has to live and act. -Ayn Rand Private correspondence to John Hospers (academic philosopher), April 29,1961 Letters of Ayn Rand, 1995 Chapter 7, "Letters to a Philosopher" Michael S. Berliner, ed.

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