"Anthem" by Ayn Rand



Description:

Anthem is a dystopian fiction by Ayn Rand.  It was written in 1937 and published in 1938.  The setting in is an unspecified future when humans have come to another Dark Age.  This Dark Age has led to the concept of individuality to be banned.  People are now considered a collective group, only using plural pronouns.  No one has an individual name.  Children are no longer raised by mothers and fathers.  Children are conceived only for the sole purpose of procreation.  Men and women no longer get married or are able to interact with one another.  Everything in life is determined by the many different councils: jobs, who you mate with, where you live, etc.

In this story, we follow the life of Equality 7-2521.  Equality is a 21-year-old man who wants to become a scholar.  His wish is unfulfilled due to being assigned to be a Street Sweeper.  When you being to read the text, you told about Equality’s experiments that have been performed in a tunnel of an old railway; this is one of the many transgressions he commits against the societal beliefs.  Equality meets a 17-year-old girl named Liberty 5-3000.  He gives her a unique name, which is forbidden for anyone to do.  Equality gets is eventually caught and punished for his crimes against the whole of the community.  Equality runs away to escape his fate and finds new life as an individual.


Biography:

Ayn Rand was born in Russia in 1905.  She grew up witnessing the ways communism effected the people in her country.  When she moved to the U.S. she had begun writing.  Anthem was originally written as a play; then she decided to start writing it as a magazine publication.  Her editor told her to try writing it as a novella, so she did.  The book was first published in England in 1938.  She revised the book later and it was finally published in the U.S. 1946.  Before it was published in the U.S. Rand had published a book called We the Living both in the U.S. and England.  Many of Rand’s writings are challenging socialism and communism from her view on how they worked.  Rand wanted to push for a movement against collectivism.


Rational:

This book helps promote awareness of political and ethical issues of many ideas throughout the world.  Many students do not have an interest in learning about politics. By using this book students would be given a vehicle to start the thought process of how politics can and will affect them.

The Lexile level is targeted for more of a 5th-8th grade reading level.  But, if I were to use this book in the classroom it would be for a 9th-10th grade classroom just because of content.


Teaching Ideas:

·        A role play assignment would be a good way to see how the government in the book is functioning.  Most of the class would be given set roles on how to interact with one another; while a small portion of the class would have a different role that didn’t fit with the majority.  The students would have different way to react to how those outside the majority acted.
·        Having students do a group project doing research on how countries with standardized tests determine the career path of those who take the tests. Then give a presentation on how those tests affect the people in the country.
·        Students write a short essay on how they think their lives would be different if they could no longer think of themselves as individuals but as a collective group.


Obstacles:

Some obstacles I can see is that parents wouldn’t want their child to read a book that might reinforce the idea of challenging authority.  Parents may also be concerned about the political discussions that may occur and challenge what they believe.

Administration, parents, and students may be uncomfortable how sex is described in the book.  Sex is initially seen as something shameful humans have to do to keep on going as a society.  But Equality describes it as a pleasure.

Sources:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand
aynrand.org
scholastic.com

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