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From: mpsilvertone@yahoo.com (HarryLime)
Newsgroups: alt.arts.poetry.comments,rec.arts.poems
Subject: Re: The Psycho-epistemolgy of MMP
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2025 20:53:07 +0000
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On Mon, 3 Feb 2025 20:25:03 +0000, HarryLime wrote:

> On Mon, 3 Feb 2025 19:31:19 +0000, George J. Dance wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 2 Feb 2025 1:56:45 +0000, Michael Monkey Peabrain aka
>> "HarryLime" wrote:
>>> On Sat, 1 Feb 2025 23:24:09 +0000, George J. Dance wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 1 Feb 2025 5:20:24 +0000, HarryLime wrote:
>>>>> On Fri, 31 Jan 2025 23:38:44 +0000, George J. Dance wrote:
>>>>>>> On Fri, 17 Jan 2025 4:07:04 +0000, George J. Dance wrote:
>>>>>> For now I think of him as the Toohey type, but that could just be my
>>>>>> personal bias. The difference being that: Wynand was a Nietzschean; he
>>>>>> just wanted the power to control reality for itself, without any regard
>>>>>> for how it was used; while Toohey did have an agenda, a malevolent one
>>>>>> of stamping out and destroying all independent thought and creativity.
>>>>>
>>>>> Hmm... as a publisher, I foster creativity -- providing other poets with
>>>>> a forum in which to showcase their works.
>>>>
>>>> Doesn't help; I'm sure that both Wynand and Toohey would have said they
>>>> were "fostering creativity." As a publisher, Wynand employed several
>>>> columnists who could write what they wanted -- unless they wrote
>>>> something he didn't like, in which case he'd "ban" (fire) them. That
>>>> last sounds like you. While Toohey's war on independent thought and
>>>> creativity was to assemble a collective of mediocre talents and promote
>>>> the hell out of them. That also sounds like you.
>>>>
>>>> I'm afraid the question is still unresolved, and you haven't done a
>>>> thing to help resolve it.
>>>
>>> You are devaluing Wynand.  Wynand's motivations were originally noble
>>> (in Ayn Rand's view), but he became corrupted (or, rather, compromised)
>>> over time.  Once having established a position of wealth and power, he
>>> wanted to hold onto it, and was willing to compromise his ethics in
>>> order to do so.
>>
>> Wyand's motivations were never "noble". He was a Neitzschean, whose only
>> motivation was power; he wanted to "run things." Not power to do
>> anything, but simply power in itself; while his newspaper ran periodic
>> "crusades" (like the one to destroy Roark), Wynand himself didn't care
>> about them. While he did have some things he valued in his private life,
>> he kept that strictly hidden away. they did not motivate his public
>> life; and there is no indication in the book that he had any ethics at
>> all.
>
> Hmm...
>
> I just rewatched the movie a year or so ago, and so am more familiar
> with that version of Wynand.
>
> I just googled "gail wynand character overview" to see if you the book
> version was different, and here's the first result that came up:
>
> "Like Roark, Wynand has extraordinary capabilities and energy, but
> unlike Roark he lets the world corrupt him. When we first meet Wynand,
> he is entirely a man of the outside world, exclusively involved with
> society and its interests. His youthful idealism has been crushed by the
> world's cynicism."
>
> That's pretty close to my description of him above.
>
> Perhaps you're due for a "refresher" read of Rand's book.
>
>
>>> This is opposed to Roark, who is willing to risk
>>> everything he owns, and all of the progress he has made in the hierarchy
>>> of his chosen field, to be true to his personal values.
>>
>> The difference between them is not whether they were true to their
>> values, but what values they were true to. Roark valued creativity,
>> doing things; Wynand valued having power, "running things" and the
>> people who did them.
>
> Again, that was not my reading (which the internet interpretation
> confirms).
>
> You don't seem to be getting the full picture of Wynand's character --
> but then you *always* recast everything in the simplest of
> black-and-white terms.
>
>>> Wynand redeems himself later in the novel, and is last seen having
>>> returned to his original, Ubermenschian self.
>>
>> Yes, that part of the story has a happy ending; Wynand "redeems" himself
>> by shutting down the Banner, giving up his quest for power over others.
>> As you know, Rand began writing /The Fountainhead/ as a Nietzchean, and
>> finished it as an Objectivist; and the story of Wynand symbolizes that
>> transition.
>>
>> Except for that happy ending, Wynand is the character that fits you
>> best. You're still stuck in that quest for power for its own sake.
>
> Just because Rand modified her ideology a bit, doesn't mean that she
> recast Wynand as a one-dimensional representation of something bad.
> Roark has always struck me (and pretty much everyone else who's ever
> read the book) as being the poster boy for the Nietzschean Ubermensch.
>
> Wynand was an Ubermensch who *compromised* his principles in order to
> maintain his wealth and power.  He wasn't representing the Nietzschean
> ideal -- he was representing the *failure* of it. Roark, otoh,
> represented a successful incarnation of that same ideal.  He was
> ultimately successful because he refused to compromise his ethics for
> success, wealth, and fame.
>
>
>>> Toohey, otoh, is a one-dimensional symbol of the Communist party
>>> leaders.  Toohey pretends to represent the people, but is using their
>>> collective support as a means to self-empowerment.
>>
>> No, that's wrong, too IMO. Toohey sincerely believed himself to be a
>> selfless servant of the people; his goal was not personal wealth or
>> power. Though, since you've been identified with Wynand, there is no
>> reason to discuss the other villains in the novel.
>>
>> And that's enough for now. I have things to do.
>
> 1) As noted above, Wynand is not a villain.  He is a tragic figure (a
> failed Ubermensch), until the novel's end wherein he is redeemed.
> 2) I just googled Toohey, and here's what Sparknotes has to say: "His
> tactics frequently evoke those of Joseph Stalin, the former Russian
> revolutionary who emerged as Russia's dictator."
>
> You really don't get Ayn Rand, George.  I find this revelation most
> disheartening, as you claim to have read and studied all of her works.
> To have missed her messages on pretty much every level imaginable, is...
> well, it would be comparable to how I would feel if I found out that I'd
> spent the past 40-odd years having misunderstood everything written by
> Edgar Poe.

It's also telling that you would have some (false) empathy for Toohey
(the actual villain) while failing to recognize the inherently noble
nature of Wynand.

Remember that I was the one who compared you to Toohey in the first
place.

I once wrote a post about you, where I said that you weren't the asshole
everyone thought you were.  I argued that you weren't supporting the
Donkey and his Stink to troll the rest of us; you were doing it because
you truly believed that you were standing up for the proverbial "little
guy."

I said that you didn't publish the book of Donkey poetry just so that he
could say that he was published too, but because you actually believed
that there was value in even the most poorly written poetry if the
speaker was expressing something real to him. You believed that poetry
was as much the property of the uneducated, downtrodden masses as it was
of the pampered academics, and that finding value in the writings of a
homeless drunk was a way of celebrating poetry's universal nature.

I believe you said that it brought a tear to your eye while you were
reading it.

And that's exactly the sort of thing that "One Small Voice" Toohey would
do. The only difference that you actually believe the socialist ideals
behind what you're doing -- while Toohey was doing such things *solely*
to exploit the "little men" of the world as his tools.

--