•Author of ‘Old School’ and ‘This Boy’s Life’ to speak at OSU 
Corvallis Gazette Times (OR) On a planned visit by Tobias Wolff to speak at Oregon State University.In [Old School], Wolff tells the story of a boy in prep school in 1962 who hides the pain in his life by telling stories and then aspires to become a writer. He pursues a writing competition because the winner will meet Robert Frost, Ayn Rand and Ernest Hemingway, and his obsession with meeting Hemingway may prove his undoing. 09:43 AM    View blog reactions

•Brazil: The road to Paraty 
Craig Parker, Gringoes.com Travel article.Paraty remains unspoiled by human progress. All Ayn Rand architects, be forewarned: you can build the Freedom Tower monuments, palatial tributes, and multi-national testaments to greed. Paraty you will not touch. 12:47 PM    View blog reactions

• •Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt eyeing Atlas Shrugged 
Nick Smith, Sony-PS3.ca Atlas Shrugged is a behemoth at over 1,100 pages, and could be used a deadly weapon if need be. The book is going to have to be seriously sliced and diced or it could be the longest movie in the history of mankind. 12:35 PM    View blog reactions

• • •‘Atlas’ pic mapped 
Pamela McClintock, Variety "Atlas Shrugged," which runs more than 1,100 pages, has faced a lengthy and circuitous journey to a film adaptation. The Russian-born author's seminal tome, published in 1957, revolves around the economic collapse of the U.S. sometime in the future and espouses her individualistic philosophy of objectivism. The violent, apocalyptic ending has always posed a challenge but could prove especially so in the post-9/11 climate. 12:31 PM    View blog reactions

• •‘Atlas Shrugged’ on the big screen 
Matt Lewis, Human Events Online This is a chance for mainstream Americans to be exposed to a film that reinforces the message that individualism should be rewarded by society, and that socialism and dictatorship should be eschewed. 12:27 PM    View blog reactions

•More images of the Prophet 
Nathan Conz, Hartford Advocate (CT) Report on Brandon Cropper's posting of fliers depicting Mohammed on the Central Connecticut State University campus.Cropper describes himself as a fire-breathing objectivist, a follower of the philosophy of Ayn Rand. His objectivist views were part of what prompted him to post the fliers, he says. 12:22 PM    View blog reactions

• •Lionsgate picks up rights to “Atlas Shrugged” movie 
Rebecca Murray, About.com It's all just rumors and semi-educated guesses at this point, however Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's names have been thrown out as two potential stars of "Atlas Shrugged." 12:20 PM    View blog reactions

• •‘Atlas Shrugged’ at Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt duo re-hash 
Toshiba Reynolds, Post Chronicle After years of delays, it appears that the famous novel 'Atlas Shrugged' by author Ayn Rand may be made into a movie. Published in 1957, it is considered by many Ayn Rand's masterpiece and the culmination of her career as a novelist. 12:17 PM    View blog reactions

• •Why Europe should reject U.S. market capitalism 
William Pfaff, International Herald Tribune Two of the most important influences on the new capitalism were academic in origin, and the third, improbably, was an instance of romanticized egoism. [...] The third influence was an eccentric one, important in the United States. It was the creation by a Russian-American novelist, Ayn Rand, of a "philosophy" of heroic egoism and pursuit of individual self-interest (against the mob and the weak) by superior persons. 12:11 PM    View blog reactions

• •Five things you need to know: Iran, Ballad of Feeney Tom, euro inflation, Intel, Who is John Galt? 
Minyanville (New York) According to Variety, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are rumored to be big names attached to a possible Hollywood production of Ayn Rand's most ambitious work, Atlas Shrugged. 12:08 PM    View blog reactions

• •Objectivists host panel on Danish cartoons 
Laura Bishop, Chicago Maroon (U of Chicago) Report on a University of Chicago event. 12:04 PM    View blog reactions

•At a glance 
Rich Copley, Herald-Leader (Lexington, KY) Career highlights sidebar for article on actress Patricia Neal.The Fountainhead (1949): Neal's second film for Warner Bros. was a big-screen adaptation of Ayn Rand's classic novel, with a screenplay by Rand. How you feel about the movie will largely depend on how you feel about Rand. 08:23 AM    View blog reactions

•A life filled with drama 
Rich Copley, Herald-Leader (Lexington, KY) On actress Patricia Neal.Offscreen, Neal's life had its own drama, including an affair with Gary Cooper, her co-star in her second movie, The Fountainhead (1949), and several other films. 08:23 AM    View blog reactions

•John Fund vs the truth: How liberty lost 
Melinda Pillsbury-Foster, OpEdNews On the Wall Street Journal editorial page editor and columnist.[William F.] Buckley [...] launched attacks against two [...] major forces then formulating opinion in the Conservative Movement, Murray Rothbard, an eminent Austrian Economist, and Ayn Rand, the author of Atlas Shrugged. Both of these thinkers would become foundational influences in the new wave of libertarianism that flowed out of the failed Goldwater Campaign. 08:18 AM    View blog reactions

• •Atlas shrugs for Angelina 
Josh Tyler, Cinema Blend The Library of Congress and Amazon.com claim that "Atlas Shrugged" is the second most influential book in the world next to the Bible. This is sort of strange, since a random sampling of people I know revealed that none of them had even heard of it, while for better or worse all of them have heard of the Bible. 08:15 AM    View blog reactions

• •Pitt, Jolie may join Atlas 
Paul Davidson, IGN FilmForce At over 1,000 pages, Atlas Shrugged is one of the longest and most complex novels ever published. It's also a hugely popular and influential book, both for its story and for its ideological undertones. 08:13 AM    View blog reactions

•A gouging market 
Matthew Rothschild, The Progressive Commentary in favor of government intervention to reduce gasoline prices."Gas station owners cannot force us to buy gasoline,” writes Alex Epstein of the Ayn Rand Institute, in an article entitled ‘The Myth of Price-Gouging.’ “They can only offer us a trade, which we are free to accept or reject.” But how free is the independent trucker, or the taxicab driver, or the traveling salesperson? 08:08 AM    View blog reactions

• •Pitt and Jolie to team up for ‘Atlas Shrugged’? 
New York Post Lionsgate Films has bought the rights to the film version of the 1957 novel, considered in many polls to be one of the most influential books in history. 08:05 AM    View blog reactions

•A paper trail to the White House 
Lorraine Ahearn, News & Record (Greensboro, NC) On the appointment of Tony Snow as White House spokesman.I realize that Snow is a public figure, and no doubt has a thick hide after being in Washington so long. Still, is this really how we treat one of our own? I mean, what's next? Do we start contacting his old classmates, going through high school yearbooks he signed to see which passage he quoted from "Atlas Shrugged?" 08:02 AM    View blog reactions

• •Rand adaptation hitting big screen 
Canoe.ca After a few failed attempts to bring to life Ayn Rand's sci-fi novel "Atlas Shrugged," a deal has finally been inked with the producers of "Ray" to adapt the book for the big screen, Variety reports 02:48 PM    View blog reactions

• •Lionsgate snags ‘Atlas Shrugged’ film 
Zap2it Frat boys and self-centered individualists of the world rejoice -- Lionsgate is moving forward on a big screen adaptation of Ayn Rand's heaviest book. 02:46 PM    View blog reactions

• •Pitt and Jolie eyeing Rand team-up 
Virgin.net Rand retained script approval until her death in 1982 and, justifiably given the magnitude of [Atlas Shrugged], was not willing to approve anything mediocre. 02:43 PM    View blog reactions

• •Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie starring in Lionsgate’s Atlas Shrugged? 
MovieWeb Lionsgate has bought the rights to Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged. 02:41 PM    View blog reactions

• •Brangelina circling Atlas 
Empire Movies Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are rumored to be circling the leading roles of the bigscreen adaptation of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. 08:55 AM    View blog reactions

• •Jolie and Pitt make Atlas 
Clint Morris, Moviehole Angie and Brad are said to be circling Lionsgate’s “Atlas Shrugged”, a film based on Ayn Rand's best-selling book. At 1,100 pages the book would be quite a challenge to adapt to film – but scribes Howard and Karen Baldwin (“Ray”) have apparently made a good go of it. 08:53 AM    View blog reactions