Autarchies : the invention of selfishness / David Ashford.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Ashford, David, Dr., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rand, Ayn--Influence.

Rand, Ayn.

Stirner, Max, 1806-1856. Einzige und sein Eigentum.

Stirner, Max.

Objectivism (Philosophy).

Neoliberalism.

Selfishness.

Physical Description:

182 pages ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2017.

Summary:

The philosophy of Ayn Rand has had a role equal or greater than that of Milton Friedman or F.A. Hayek in shaping the contemporary neo-liberal consensus. Its impact was powerful on architects of Reaganomics such as Alan Greenspan, former Director of the World Bank, and the new breed of American industrialists who developed revolutionary information technologies in Silicon Valley. But what do we really know of Rand's philosophy? Is her gospel of selfishness really nothing more than a reiteration of a quintessentially American "rugged individualism"? This book argues that Rand's philosophy can in fact be traced back to a moment, before World War I, when the work of a now-forgotten German philosopher called Max Stirner possessed an extraordinary appeal for writers and artists across Europe. The influence of Stirnerian Egoism upon that phase of intense creative innovation we now call Modernism was seminal.

Contents:

1 The North Pole of the Ego: The Politics of Parisian Dada 1

2 Philosophic Algebra: Dora Marsden's Lingual Psychology 51

3 The Siberia of the Mind: Wyndham Lewis: The Modernist as Egoist 89

4 A New Concept of Egoism: The Late-Modernism of Ayn Rand 119.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 175-178) and index.

ISBN:

1474297692

9781474297691

9781474297707

1474297706

OCLC:

950430524