Ayn Rand: Writing a Gospel of Success by Alexandra PopoffMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is a decent biography of Rand: it covers the main points of her life in concise and clear ways. Popoff tries to be balanced and fair to Rand; she includes points of view from critics and followers alike. There are only a few slips of snide remarks that make there way in to the book. The book is its best and most interesting when recreating from letters Rand's life in Russia and her early days in the US.
The discussion of Rand's ideas are superficial and often muddled: Popoff is not a philosopher and is a bit of her depth here. The discussions of Rand's fiction is better, though predictably falls into the all too common (but unwarranted) criticisms of wooden characters that are only symbols.
Given that this was part of the Jewish Lives series and the suggestion on the back cover of discussion of the Jewishness of her characters, I was really interested to see what was said about Rand, her Jewishness, and the Jewishness of her characters and work. However, this was rather disappointing. There just wasn't a lot here. In the first part of the book, her life in Russia and her family, there is more discussed -- though this often more suggestion and speculation than substantive connections. As for Rand's character, fiction, and philosophy and what might have been Jewish about that, there is little that wasn't superficial or speculation.
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