On Saturday, October 23, 1999 10:47 PM phil osborn philosborn@hotmail.com
wrote:
> >I believe "Ayn" came from a Swedish author she knew of. Not that that's
> >important. I know "Rand" came from a typewriter.
>
> Ayn Rand means "a field of gold," in, I believe, Dutch, and it is my
> understanding that that is why she chose it.
Actually, Amara Graps is more precise than me ("Ayn" was a Finnish writer whose name she took), but where did you get the idea about that? It's nice to speculate, but the Barbara Branden is probably in the best position to know.
This whole thread started, I believe, about Ayn Rand wanting to deny her Jewish heritage. That may be so, but I think it goes deeper. I think she wanted to deny all heritage, to appear, to herself and to the world, as something new and fresh, like Zarathrustra coming down from the mountains.
Others, notably Ronald Merrill, have also pointed out the Biblical allusions in her novels, especially in _Atlas Shrugged_. (See his _The Ideas of Ayn Rand_.) So, it's obvious she did not forget her heritage, even if she did try to deny it. (See also Chris Sciabarra's _Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical_ which details what she got, probably unwittingly, from Russian philosophy.)
Cheers!
Daniel Ust
http://mars.superlink.net/neptune/