A Summary of Anthem by Ayn Rand

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A utopia is a community which possesses highly desirable or perfect qualities. The beginning of the book Anthem, written by Ayn Rand, is supposed to be represented as a utopia, but the reader soon discovers that it is actually a dystopia; which is merely the opposite of a utopia. The main character of the book, Equality 7-2521, explains to the reader that there are many laws and regulations that the people of City must obey such as: not to write or have their own thoughts, citizens can’t have individual names, and the citizens of the city also have to refer to themselves as “we.” Equality 7-2521 soon realizes that a society that lacks individualism does nothing to make the community prosper; meaning there must be a stop to the collectivism within the city. Equality 7-2521 is introduced within the first sentence as the narrator of the book in which he says, “It is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil.” (Page 17) When Equality 7-2521 said this statement, he was writing in his di...

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