Goddess of the Market
Ayn Rand and the American Right
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Narrated by:
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Suzanne Toren
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By:
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Jennifer Burns
About this listen
Worshipped by her fans, denounced by her enemies, and forever shadowed by controversy and scandal, the novelist and philosopher Ayn Rand was a powerful thinker whose views on government and markets shaped the conservative movement from its earliest days. Drawing on unprecedented access to Rand's private papers and the original, unedited versions of Rand's journals, Jennifer Burns offers a groundbreaking reassessment of this key cultural figure, examining her life, her ideas, and her impact on conservative political thought. Goddess of the Market follows Rand from her childhood in Russia through her meteoric rise from struggling Hollywood screenwriter to bestselling novelist, including the writing of her wildly successful The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Burns highlights the two facets of Rand's work that make her a perennial draw for those on the right: Her promotion of capitalism, and her defense of limited government. Both sprang from her early, bitter experience of life under Communism, and became among the most deeply enduring of her messages, attracting a diverse audience of college students and intellectuals, business people and Republican Party activists, libertarians and conservatives. The book also traces the development of Rand's Objectivist philosophy and her relationship with Nathaniel Branden, her closest intellectual partner, with whom she had an explosive falling out in 1968.
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Making History
- The Storytellers Who Shaped the Past
- By: Richard Cohen
- Narrated by: Richard Cohen
- Length: 26 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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There are many stories we can spin about previous ages, but which accounts get told? And by whom? Is there even such a thing as “objective” history? In this “witty, wise, and elegant” (The Spectator), book, Richard Cohen reveals how professional historians and other equally significant witnesses, such as the writers of the Bible, novelists, and political propagandists, influence what becomes the accepted record. Cohen argues, for example, that some historians are practitioners of “Bad History” and twist reality to glorify themselves or their country.
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Missing 20 pages from book
- By Rick, Austin on 04-23-22
By: Richard Cohen
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Dark Star Rising
- Magick and Power in the Age of Trump
- By: Gary Lachman
- Narrated by: Jason Culp
- Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Within the concentric circles of Trump's regime lies an unseen culture of occultists, power-seekers, and mind-magicians whose influence is on the rise. In this unparalleled account, historian Gary Lachman examines the influence of occult and esoteric philosophy on the unexpected rise of the alt-right.
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Step Right This Way!
- By Brad on 06-03-18
By: Gary Lachman
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The War on the West
- By: Douglas Murray
- Narrated by: Douglas Murray
- Length: 12 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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In The War on the West, Douglas Murray shows how many well-meaning people have been fooled by hypocritical and inconsistent anti-West rhetoric. After all, if we must discard the ideas of Kant, Hume, and Mill for their opinions on race, shouldn’t we discard Marx, whose work is peppered with racial slurs and anti-Semitism? Embers of racism remain to be stamped out in America, but what about the raging racist inferno in the Middle East and Asia?
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Every Human (seriously, everyone) Read This!
- By aaron on 04-27-22
By: Douglas Murray
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Becoming Hitler
- The Making of a Nazi
- By: Thomas Weber
- Narrated by: Alex Hyde-White
- Length: 14 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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In Becoming Hitler, award-winning historian Thomas Weber examines Adolf Hitler's time in Munich between 1918 and 1926, the years when Hitler shed his awkward, feckless persona and transformed himself into a savvy opportunistic political operator who saw himself as Germany's messiah. The story of Hitler's transformation is one of a fateful match between man and city. After opportunistically fluctuating between the ideas of the left and the right, Hitler emerged as an astonishingly flexible leader of Munich's right-wing movement.
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talented malevolence c a dash of amazing luck
- By emilio squillante on 11-05-18
By: Thomas Weber
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Passionate Sage
- The Character and Legacy of John Adams
- By: Joseph J. Ellis
- Narrated by: Tom Parker
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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John Adams, one of the Founding Fathers of our nation and its second president, spent nearly the last third of his life in retirement, grappling with contradictory views of his place in history and fearing his reputation would not fare well in the generations after his death. And indeed, future generations did slight him, elevating Jefferson and Madison to lofty heights while Adams remained way back in the second tier.
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Stays true to Audible's description
- By Neil on 10-24-09
By: Joseph J. Ellis
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The Communist
- Frank Marshall Davis: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mentor
- By: Paul Kengor
- Narrated by: Pete Larkin
- Length: 11 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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In his memoir, Barack Obama omits the full name of his mentor, simply calling him "Frank." Now, the truth is out: Never has a figure as deeply troubling and controversial as Frank Marshall Davis had such an impact on the development of an American president. Although other radical influences on Obama - from Jeremiah Wright to Bill Ayers-have been scrutinized, the public knows little about Davis, a card-carrying member of the Communist Party USA, cited by the Associated Press as an "important influence" on Obama....
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So that's where Obama got many of his ideas!
- By Mike on 09-17-12
By: Paul Kengor
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C. S. Lewis - A Life
- Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet
- By: Alister E. McGrath
- Narrated by: Robin Sachs
- Length: 13 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In honor of the 50th anniversary of C. S. Lewis' death, celebrated Oxford don Dr. Alister McGrath presents us with a compelling and definitive portrait of the life of C. S. Lewis, the author of the well-known Narnia series. For more than half a century, C. S. Lewis’ Narnia series has captured the imaginations of millions. In C. S. Lewis - A Life, Dr. Alister McGrath recounts the unlikely path of this Oxford don, who spent his days teaching English literature to the brightest students in the world and his spare time writing.
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Awakening my curiosity and desire to read more!
- By Pearl Glacier on 03-13-13
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1620
- A Critical Response to the 1619 Project
- By: Peter W. Wood
- Narrated by: Stephen Bowlby
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Was America founded on the auction block in Jamestown in 1619 or aboard the Mayflower in 1620? The controversy erupted in August 2019 when the New York Times announced its 1619 Project. The Times set to transform history by asserting that all the laws, material gains, and cultural achievements of Americans are rooted in the exploitation of African Americans. Historians have pushed back, saying that the 1619 Project conjures a false narrative out of racial grievance.
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I'm Sympathetic, but wanting balance, not found.
- By Anonymous User on 11-21-20
By: Peter W. Wood
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The Metaphysical Club
- By: Louis Menand
- Narrated by: Henry Leyva
- Length: 6 hrs and 53 mins
- Abridged
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Hardly a club in the conventional sense, the organization referred to in the title of this superb literary hybrid (part history, part biography, part philosophy) consisted of four members and probably existed for less than nine months.
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The Great American Experiment
- By Victoria on 12-08-03
By: Louis Menand
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At the Existentialist Café
- Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails
- By: Sarah Bakewell
- Narrated by: Antonia Beamish
- Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Paris, 1933: Three contemporaries meet over apricot cocktails at the Bec-de-Gaz bar on the rue Montparnasse. They are the young Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and longtime friend Raymond Aron, a fellow philosopher who raves to them about a new conceptual framework from Berlin called phenomenology. "You see," he says, "if you are a phenomenologist, you can talk about this cocktail and make philosophy out of it!"
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Consistent look at incoherent philosophy
- By Gary on 06-19-16
By: Sarah Bakewell
What listeners say about Goddess of the Market
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Riccardo Leggio
- 12-24-23
Jennifer Burns is a masterful writer
This book is a model for excellent writing, especially noteworthy for keeping a fair balanced tone and appraisal of someone as divisive as Rand.
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- Valentin F.
- 04-13-22
Insightful
Suzanne does a wonderful job reading Jennifer Burns book on Ayn. I have always enjoyed Ayn’s work and am constantly having to defend my enjoyment of her books. This provides additional insight into the writer and the motivation behind her most accomplished work.
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- David
- 09-28-15
The more I learn the less I respect
This book does a lot. She looks not only at Rand's life, but those who influenced her thinking, her developing ideas, and the impacts her ideas have had on the world at large. Given the content of her novels a lot of what appears in these pages shouldn't be surprising. She appears cut off from reality in so many ways. She either couldn't recognize or couldn't acknowledge that no idea is completely original, it all stands on the ideas of those that came before us. And, it is that insecurity which so limited her ideas and development. I am stunned by the impact she has had, and I failed to recognize the long reach in to so many areas. It is shocking that such poor work as Rand's has been taken so seriously by so many. This is a very important area of study. And, you get the see the problem where things like the 2008 crash which should raise questions about the viability of the unrestricted Free Market, only gets answered with "the true free market doesn't exist" and that, they see as the problem. I think the author does a great job and looking at the underpinnings of Rand's ideas. If anyone needed to "check their premises, " it was Rand herself. It's noteworthy to see who young she was when the Russian Revolution devastated her family. I've although thought that had a profound influence on her thinking. In her novels, there is a "collectivist" under every bush, and the rants at the end of her life, seem to confirm this paranoid world view.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Rodger P. Paxton
- 11-14-17
Wow!
I learned more about Ayn Rand than I ever thought I needed to know. Well written book. Expertly narrated.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Sarah Forbes Keough
- 08-05-19
A balanced perspective rooted in historical facts
This was a great telling of Ayn Rand’s life. I was afraid it’d be too partisan but instead it offered a balanced perspective. Rand lived a fascinating life. Jennifer Burns captured her life and put it in a historical context like no other could.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Andrej Drapal
- 03-14-18
Unfortunate
Example of a biography where the writer has already a bias. In this case negativity is clearly seen.
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7 people found this helpful
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- AMeador1
- 09-04-20
Valuable for historical context-but not much else
There is a lot here in terms of Rand's life in terms of her relations with people - like von Mises, her "collective", her relations with those in the upper echelons of the Libertarian movement, politicians, friends, and family. But her analysis of the relations and how they impacted Rand have to be weighed against this author's clear misunderstandings of the deeper constructs of Objectivism. I think it is much like someone with a bit of Algebra skills trying to take on the PhD thesis of a masterful mathematician. Without a highly skilled level of mathematical skill - it is hardly believable that they could understand the concepts involved - especially to the level of throwing mud on the ideas of the mathematician s complex thesis. This is the case here. The little jabs, digs, and commentary when she obviously doesn't understand Rand's philosophy in more than a superficial study is annoying. I like the context of what were some of Rand's relations, sources, etc... as it gives me more to research further myself. I would like to see what Rand saw in developing her ideas. It helps to further strengthen one's own knowledge - first handedly instead of simply taking someone's word on something - including Rand's. But, for people that may see this without a strong knowledge of Rand's works and Objectivism - it can easily lead to those with the actually childish observation, that Objectivism and Rand were juvenile. I suppose for a person with a juvenile understanding of the Objectivist system of philosophy - that may appear to be the case. More knowledge is valuable - so it is worth something. But not as a source of knowledge of what was in Rand's mind or into the philosophic system of Objectivism.
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1 person found this helpful