Atlas Shrugged

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1957

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1, Chapters 1-5

Part 1, Chapters 6-10

Part 2, Chapters 1-5

Part 2, Chapters 6-10

Part 3, Chapters 1-5

Part 3, Chapters 6-10

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

The Dollar Sign

The Objectivist Perspective of Morality considers productivity and the accumulation of value via money for one’s own satisfaction to be the height of virtue. To an objectivist, material wealth is an important indicator of moral worth. Rand uses the recurring symbol of the dollar sign to reinforce this principle and to indicate which characters have adopted the objectivist system of morality.

This symbol has been adopted by the men of Galt’s Gulch to represent their society and their values. A large golden dollar sign hangs over the valley itself and is stamped on the cigarettes, which first clues Dagny in on the existence of their community. As workers abandon their posts and disappear in the final, turbulent days of the looters’ society, many of them leave behind dollar signs to indicate their support for Galt’s principles. When Dagny herself leaves Taggart Transcontinental to rescue and join Galt, her final farewell is a dollar sign drawn in lipstick on the plinth of Nat Taggart’s statue.

In the final line of the novel, Galt “trace[s] in space the sign of the dollar” over the world beyond their valley (1168). This symbolizes the power that he holds, reinforces his role as a prophet for objectivist values, and alludes to the fact that they now plan to roll out their model of an objectivist utopia across the whole country. Overall, the dollar sign is a symbol of hope (in objectivist terms) and a mark of defiance against those who would exploit their fellow man in terms of monetary value.

The Chain Bracelet of Rearden Metal

A recurring symbol in the novel is a simple chain bracelet that Rearden makes out of the first pour of Rearden Metal. The new alloy marks the culmination of a decade’s research and development and symbolizes Rearden’s genius, his productivity, and ultimately his heroism (as the novel defines it) in relation to Radical Individualism and Idolization of the Lone Genius Archetype.

Rearden initially gives the bracelet to his wife, Lilian, but he actually created it not for Lilian specifically but for “his wife” as an abstract concept because doing so is a means of self-gratification. According to The Objectivist Perspective of Morality, such an act of selfishness is a virtue. However, Rearden is unable to find satisfaction in the gift because he has surrendered power to Lilian by buying into traditional social conventions and morals. Consequently, he is punished by her contempt, his mother’s admonishment, and the pity and derision that Lilian intentionally provokes in her guests by parading the bracelet around at her party in an unflattering manner. In her hands, the bracelet is a symbol of the exploitative power dynamics that define their marriage.

When Dagny claims the bracelet from Lilian, it marks the beginning of Rearden’s liberation from his wife. Once their affair is underway in earnest, Rearden consents to place the bracelet on Dagny’s wrist himself, reclaiming it as a symbol of his strength and virtue. Due to her objectivist ideology, Dagny revels in receiving it alongside Rearden’s other gifts as a means of his gratification rather than hers.

Project X

Project X is the ultimate symbol of the looters’ immorality under The Objectivist Perspective of Morality. Non-violence is a fundamental objectivist principle, and the use of force is one of the main crimes committed by the looters as their system fails and they descend into chaos and disorder.

Project X is analogous to the nuclear weapons that both sides of the Cold War were accumulating during the second half of the 20th century. Its only potential function is destruction, and this threat of force is a tool for oppression rather than protection.