Abstract

Ayn Rand's dystopian work, Anthem, has primarily been read as a critical response to the communist collectivism of the Russia of her youth. However, a close consideration of the religious allusions in the text reveals that Rand was responding to religious collectivism as much as to the communist variety. In fact, Rand's personal writings reveal that Anthem's apotheosis of man is a response to religion's denial of self, which Rand viewed as the offense of a collectivist society. In Anthem, Rand emphasizes her opposition to religion through the ironic employment of religious themes and images.