Further questions for Discussion or Written Response

1. Before reading the novel

   The transition from adolescence to adulthood involves developing a personal identity, a sense of self. Write a paragraph that describes you, and explains what makes you uniquely you. Consider your future goals and dreams; what you value in a friend; favorite pets; preferred sports and hobbies; best-loved music, literature, movies, etc.

   Note to the teacher: Discuss with the students how and why they chose these values. Focus on the role of the individual mind in developing values. You want students to understand that—without a mind to think, to judge, to choose—there can be no personal values and ambitions.

   After reading the novel

   Review your pre-reading activity. Which of your personal values, goals, and loves would be allowed in the society portrayed in Anthem? Why would any of them be forbidden?

   Note to the teacher: This exercise can help students to concretize and relate to the completely selfless society in Anthem. Students can see how living in this society would affect them directly. They will more fully understand the link between the obliteration of the mind and the destruction of all personal judgments, hopes, dreams, and values.

2. In many real and fictionalized totalitarian societies, children live apart from their families. Why would dictatorial leaders enforce this living arrangement?

3. What does Equality finally understand about his society when the Council threatens to destroy his invention?

4. Contrast Equality’s view of morality at the end of the novel to that of his society.

5. At first glance, most characters in Anthem appear to be near-automatons, blindly conforming to the rest of society. Upon closer study, however, we see that all of the characters in Anthem—Equality, International, Liberty, the Council members, everyone—make choices and decisions that affect their lives and their futures, for better or for worse. In short, they all possess the choice to think or not, and that choice determines everything else. Discuss.

6. Many people blame their hardships, poverty, or unhappiness on external conditions. “It’s not my fault,” they cry, “it’s because of the family, class, race, society, or culture into which I was born!” They believe that outside factors control and determine their lives. Use Equality as an example to refute this deterministic view of man.

7. Anthem is a heroic and inspiring story about the triumph of the individual’s independent spirit. Even though, at the end of the novel, Equality is greatly outnumbered, and modern society lies in ruins, it is a story of liberation and hope—not of despair. Discuss.

8. Aside from very rare exceptions (Equality, the Saint at the Pyre) there is literally no opposition to the leaders in this society. Why is this? What ideas must these men have accepted to live a life of obedience, drudgery, and fear?

9. Anthem’s theme is, in Ayn Rand’s own words, “the meaning of man’s ego.” Explain the ways in which the characters and plot in Anthem illustrate this theme.

10. To fully control a man, dictators must not only enslave his body, but also destroy his mind. Discuss how the leaders in Anthem seek to accomplish this tyrannical end.