Upgraded from an exchange in the Moot:
Re-reading Atlas Shrugged as an adult for my market polemics course at UCB I must say that I have found few texts more relentlessly hackneyed, hyperbolic, fundamentalist-literalist, deluded, deceptive, brain-deadening, and death-dealing in all my acquaintance.
It is a testament to the self-congratulatory conformism of American "individualism" and to the hungry consumerism of American "rebelliousness" and to the stubborn insulation from consequences of American "exceptionalism" and to the eager brutality of American "culture" more generally that La Rand and her ponderous potboilers have managed never to be anything less than bestsellers here, even decades after her death.
Behind the Music: Atlas Shrugged provides a more considered take, should you pine for one.
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A slightly politically-incorrect take on What Might Be
Going On with Ayn Rand:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AllAmazonsWantHercules
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All Amazons Want Hercules
52. A high-ranking matriarch, in a society that
oppresses men, falls for the Hero's rugged charms.
— from The Grand List Of Overused Science Fiction Clichés
by John VanSickle
This trope is Older Than Dirt: in Greek mythology, Hercules
is sent on a quest to the land of the Amazons in order to
steal the golden girdle of Hippolyta. The two of them
battled to a stalemate and the queen is so impressed with
him she gives it up freely, If You Know What I Mean.
Also, the trope is, arguably, likely descended from a
female primal instinct to seek out, or in turn accept,
only the absolute best, e.g. most ruthlessly powerful,
males to sire and protect any young.
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