Individuality And Creativity In Ayn Rand's Anthem

The Russo-American author who founded the philosophical system of “Objectivism” Ayn Rand. A person who immigrated to the United States back in the late 20s. "Anthem", is a novella she wrote that was originally published in 1938 in the United Kingdom. A valuable thing this novella teaches the reader is how powerful individual thought and creativity is, how precious it is to think the way you want to and not have to abide to what others think or say. This story depicts a world in the future, a collectivist dictatorship in which Individuality and Creativity are crimes.

In the novella, one must abide to there not being freedom of speech or thought. One example of this is how one is simply punished for voicing an opinion of his own self and not of his brothers and sisters. This is due to how this society is run on Collectivism. When Equality writes, he clearly states how it is a sin to write one’s thoughts as such a thing is a crime in the eyes of the government.

There are several examples, but the most important is Equality, who from a young age always viewed himself as above his brothers, he saw himself as an individual in a lot of cases, and for the way he acted, this resulted in him being punished when he graduated from his Home of Students. The poor man Equality was always treated in an unjust and prejudicial fashion because of his “curse” of being and thinking differently than the rest, therefore that is what links to the transgression he