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More oxford books @ www.OxfordeBook.comFore more urdu books visit www.4Urdu.comIT USUALLY BEGINS WITH AYN RAND 263In 1968 Brand noted in his diary, “I’m reading Atlas Shrugged thesedays, again, on quite a different level—keeping some watch on myself,but mostly letting the notions run on.” He returned to Rand during aperiod of deep thinking, aided by his near daily consumption of nitrousoxide. For more than a month his journal made occasional references toRand and showed unmistakable traces of her thought. He wrote after adiscussion of Arthur Koestler’s views on abstract and emotional thought,“Don’t sever ‘em, connect ‘em up better. Then your abstract advanceswill be accompanied by emotional joy, and so forth. Which sounds AynRandish.” 47 In the Last Whole Earth Catalog, a countercultural classicthat sold more than a million copies and won a National Book Award,Brand offered a cryptic one-line review of Atlas Shrugged, “This preposterousnovel has some unusual gold in it,” followed by a short excerpt.Brand’s ability to freely mingle Rand’s ideas with futuristic themes likemoon colonization foreshadowed the emerging culture of cyberspace,which was strikingly libertarian from the beginning. 48Looking at another new movement of the 1970s, feminism, Randwas similarly critical. Like feminists Rand had always emphasizedthe importance of paid, professional work for both men and women,and her proto-feminist heroines rejected traditional female roles. Shewas also fiercely against any legal restrictions on abortion, calling it “amoral right which should be left to the sole discretion of the womaninvolved.” When New York State considered liberalizing its abortionlaws, Rand broke from her typical position of detached analysis andurged Objectivist readers to write letters in support of the proposedchange. Watching the pro-life movement take shape, Rand was aghast.“An embryo has no rights,” she insisted. The principle was basic: restrictionson abortion were immoral because they elevated a potential lifeover an actual life. It was essential that women be able to choose when,and whether, to become mothers. 49Despite this common political ground, Rand regarded the feministmovement as utterly without legitimacy. In a 1971 article, “The Ageof Envy,” she declared, “Every other pressure group has some semiplausiblecomplaint or pretense at a complaint, as an excuse for existing.Women’s Lib has none.” To Rand, feminism was simply another form ofcollectivism, a variation on Marxism that replaced the proletariat withwomen, a newly invented oppressed class. 50 The proof was in feminist