Autarchies: The Invention of Selfishness
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Overview
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.
The implications for our understanding of Modernism are profound – so too for our grasp of the “cultural logic of late capitalism”. This book presents the reader with a fresh perspective on the Modernist classics, as well as introducing less familiar art and writing that is only now beginning to attract interest in the West. It arrives at a fresh and compelling re-evaluation of Modernism: revealing its selfish streak.
Autarchies argues that the philosophy underpinning Modernism actually stems from Max Stirner’s egoism and Ayn Rand’s gospel of selfishness, with dramatic implications for our understanding of Modernist art and literature, and the contemporary cultural moment.
A political and philosophically lively book which really ‘takes on’ the philosophy underpinning late capitalism
The author, David Ashford, is an elegant and convincing writer who has contributed writings on this topic to The Cambridge Quarterly, Modernism/Modernity, Literary London and Symbiosis
The philosophy of Ayn Rand is both controversial and popular. This book, by highlighting Rand’s crucial role in the development of cultural selfishness, should cause a stir.
Introduction: The Wisdom of Rats: The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism
Chapter 1: The Accidental Regime: Max Stirner and the Politics of Selfishness
Chapter 2: Philosophic Algebra: the Modernism of Dora Marsden’s Egoist
Chapter 3: The Siberia of the Mind: Egoism in Modernist Writings
Chapter 4: A New Concept of Egoism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand
David Ashford’s alert chronicle of anarcho-modernism begins with Max Stirner and ends with Ayn Rand. Inverting the old saw (“What is an egoist? -- Someone who does not think of me!”), Ashford proves that the reverse is true: anarcho-modernism, founded on consistently contrarian selfishness, includes unforgettable egoists who matter and relate to us. Dora Marsden and Ayn Rand belong to our history of modernity along with James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis, the Dadaists and the violent anarchists of the Bonnot gang. Anarcho-modernists of the world, unite!
- Title: Autarchies: The Invention of Selfishness
- Author: David Ashford
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
- Print Publication Date: 2017
- Logos Release Date: 2024
- Pages: 208
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Ebook
- ISBNs: 9781474297714, 9781474297707, 1474297706, 1474297714
- Resource ID: LLS:9781474297714
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2025-04-22T11:10:22Z
David Ashford is a Lecturer in English at City University London, UK and chief-editor of Contraband Poetry Press. His research specialisms include Modernism, philosophy and cultural geography.