Ayn Rand Quotes

A collection of quotes by Ayn Rand.

Ayn Rand was a Russian-American writer and philosopher born on February 2, 1905, in Saint Petersburg, Russia. She is best known for her novels, including "The Fountainhead" (1943) and "Atlas Shrugged" (1957), which promoted her philosophical system known as Objectivism.

Rand grew up in a middle-class family and witnessed the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. In 1925, she immigrated to the United States, where she pursued a career as a screenwriter in Hollywood. While there, she developed her ideas about individualism, capitalism, and the importance of reason and rational self-interest.

Her first novel, "We the Living," was published in 1936, followed by "Anthem" in 1938. However, it was "The Fountainhead" that brought Rand significant fame for its celebration of egoism, individualism, and architectural aesthetics. "Atlas Shrugged," her most influential work, explored themes of individualism, capitalism, and the power of the human mind.

Aside from her fiction, Rand wrote philosophical essays, delivered lectures, and became a prominent figure in conservative and libertarian circles. She advocated for laissez-faire capitalism and the primacy of individual rights. Rand's philosophy attracted both fervent supporters and fierce critics.

Ayn Rand passed away on March 6, 1982, in New York City, leaving behind a controversial legacy. Despite the controversies surrounding her work, she remains an enduring figure in American literature and philosophy, known for her advocacy of individualism, reason, and self-interest.

The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who

The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.

To love a woman for her virtues is meaningless. She's earned

To love a woman for her virtues is meaningless. She's earned it, it's a payment, not a gift. But to love her for her vices is a real gift, unearned and undeserved. To love her for her vices is to defile all virtue for her sake - and that is a real tribute of love, because you sacrifice your conscience, your reason, your integrity and your invaluable self-esteem.

Upper classes are a nation's past the middle class is its fu

Upper classes are a nation's past the middle class is its future.

The common good of a collective -- a race, a class, a state

The common good of a collective -- a race, a class, a state -- was the claim and justification of every tyranny ever established over men. Every major horror of history was committed in the name of an altruistic motive. Has any act of selfishness ever equaled the carnage perpetrated by disciples of altruism? Does the fault lie in men's hypocrisy or in the nature of the principle? The most dreadful butchers were the most sincere. The believed in the perfect society reached through the guillotine and the firing squad. Nobody questioned their right to murder since they were murdering for an altruistic purpose. It was accepted that man must be sacrificed for other men. Actors change, but the course of the tragedy remains the same. A humanitarian who starts with the declarations of love for mankind and ends with a sea of blood. It goes on and will go on so long as men believe that an action is good if it is unselfish. That permits the altruist to act and forces his victims to bear it. The leaders of collectivist movements ask nothing of themselves. But observe the results.

Upper classes are a nation's past, the middle class its futu

Upper classes are a nation's past, the middle class its future.

To achieve, you need thought. You have to know what you are

To achieve, you need thought. You have to know what you are doing and that's real power.

We have lied to ourselves. We have not built this box for th

We have lied to ourselves. We have not built this box for the good of our brothers. We built it for its own sake. It is above all our brothers to us, and its truth above their truth.

Truth Science Creation

For this wire is as a part of our body, as a vein torn from

For this wire is as a part of our body, as a vein torn from us, glowing with our blood. Are we proud of this thread of metal, or of our hands which made it, or is there a line to divide these two?

Truth Creation Electricity

The pursuit of truth is not important. The pursuit of that t

The pursuit of truth is not important. The pursuit of that truth is important which helps you in reaching your goal that is provided you have one.

Truth Goal

He, too, stood looking at her for a moment--and it seemed to

He, too, stood looking at her for a moment--and it seemed to her that it was not a look of greeting after an absence, but the look of someone who had thought of her every day of that year. She could not be certain, it was only an instant, so brief that just as she caught it, he was turning...

Love Looking Seeing

Have you ever felt the longing for someone you could admire?

Have you ever felt the longing for someone you could admire? For something, not to look down at, but up to?

Love Inspirational Admiration Achievement Objectivism Atlas Shrugged

Why do they always teach us that it's easy and evil to do wh

Why do they always teach us that it's easy and evil to do what we want and that we need discipline to restrain ourselves? It's the hardest thing in the world--to do what we want. And it takes the greatest kind of courage. I mean, what we really want.

Life Courage Action Inspiration Career

The power of the sky can be made to do men's bidding. There

The power of the sky can be made to do men's bidding. There are no limits to its secrets and its might, and it can be made to grant us anything if we but choose to ask.

Science Pride Will

You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences

You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.

Inspirational

Man is an end in himself.

Man is an end in himself.

Life Success Philosophy Individualism Objectivism

I think that when in doubt about the truth of an issue, it's

I think that when in doubt about the truth of an issue, it's safer and in better taste to select the least numerous of the adversaries.

Truth Doubt Oppression Challenge Minority Opinion Subversion

Their eyes were dark and hard and glowing, with no fear in t

Their eyes were dark and hard and glowing, with no fear in them, no kindness and no guilt.

Beauty Pride

That love is reverence, and worship, and glory, and the upwa

That love is reverence, and worship, and glory, and the upward glance. Not a bandage for dirty sores. But they don't know it. Those who speak of love most promiscuously are the ones who've never felt it. They make some sort of feeble stew out of sympathy, compassion, comtempt, and general indiference, and they call it love. Once you've felt what it means to love as you and I know it - the total passion for the total height - you are unable of anything else.

Love Respect Passion

Keating stood still, because he understood for the first tim

Keating stood still, because he understood for the first time what it was that artists spoke about when they spoke of beauty.

Art Beauty

For our face and body were beautiful. Our face was not like

For our face and body were beautiful. Our face was not like the faces of our brothers, for we felt not pity when looking upon it. Our body was not like the bodies of our brothers, for our limbs were straigth and thin and hard and strong. And we thought that we could trust this being who looked upon us from the stream, and that we had nothing to fear with this being.

Freedom Beauty Pride Individual