Ayn Rand - Valhalla, NY - Grave of a Famous Person on Waymarking.com

“Ask yourself whether the dream of heaven and greatness should be waiting for us in our graves - or whether it should be ours here and now and on this earth.”
- Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand was born Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum in Saint Petersburg, Russia in 1905. Her childhood was disrupted by the October Revolution which ushered in the era of Bolshevik rule. These events had a profound effect on the young writer eventually influencing her strong anti-collectivist sentiments. She took on the pen name Ayn Rand at an early age while she was still living in the Soviet Union.

Having secured a visa to visit relatives in Chicago, Rand arrived in the United States in 1926. Desiring to stay in the U.S., she moved to Hollywood, determined to secure work as a screenwriter. While in Hollywood, she met and married actor Frank O’Connor. Ayn Rand had some mild success with some plays and a novel during the 1930s but her first big literary success was the 1943 novel “The Fountainhead” which was made into a movie in 1949. She followed that up with the equally successful “Atlas Shrugged” in 1957.

In her last decades, Ayn Rand spent most of her time developing and promoting her philosophy of ‘Objectivism’ which she had expounded in “Atlas Shrugged.” Objectivism stresses the importance of individual achievement while denigrating altruism and collectivism. Rand’s books have sold over 37 million copies, but her strong anti-Marxist sentiments tended to alienate her from the academic community while her atheism antagonized others. Ayn Rand died in 1982 from heart failure and was buried next to her husband in Kensico Cemetery in Westchester County, New York. I always thought the above quote would make a thought-provoking epitaph for Ayn Rand’s grave: Some would contemplate her successful life, while others would wonder what she’s thinking now.
(Source: wikipedia.org)

Description: See Long Description above. Date of birth: 02/02/1905 Date of death: 03/06/1982 Area of notoriety: Literature Marker Type: Headstone Setting: Outdoor Visiting Hours/Restrictions: 9:00 am to 5:00 pm Fee required?: No Web site: [Web Link]

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