Did you model your characters after particular individuals? - ANSWER No. All the characters are invented by me.
How did you decide upon the names for the characters in the book? - ANSWER Since the people had no concep
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Did you model your characters after particular individuals? - ANSWER No. All the characters are invented by me.
How did you decide upon the names for the characters in the book? - ANSWER Since the people had no concept of individuality, they could not have individual names—only numbers.
What race is Equality? - ANSWER Any race—since he represents the best possible to all races of men.
When Equality went into the forest, wasn't he afraid after he heard about those who never returned? - ANSWER No, he was not afraid, because he had the adventurous courage of a scientist who always wants to study the unknown. Besides, he did not want ever to return to his hometown, to the slavery of a collectivist state.
How were the people in the Unmentionable Times destroyed? - ANSWER They were destroyed by the kind of philosophy they accepted. They rejected reason, egoism, individualism and freedom—and they accepted mysticism, altruism, collectivism and dictatorship.
How can the Council of Scholars make decisions without thinking? - ANSWER They make decisions by the guidance of their feelings and by blind obedience to a government-prescribed dogma.
What was the tunnel used for in the Unmentionable Times? - ANSWER It was a subway.
Why did this society come to be, and how could it get so out of hand that almost everything was a transgression? - ANSWER When men have no rights, they are expected to live for the sake of others, anything they do for their own sake would be regarded by their rulers as a transgression.
Who picked the people for the World Council? - ANSWER The gang entrenched members of the World Council would choose its own members and perpetuate itself. As an example of such politics, see the government of Soviet Russia.
Why was unhappiness against the law? - ANSWER Because the rulers wanted no complaints; they wanted the slaves to pretend to be satisfied with the conditions of their existence.
Why was 40-45 considered old? - ANSWER Because life was so hard in such a society that men were worn out and few were able to survive to the age of 45. It is a historical fact that in primitive, pre-industrial societies, men's life expectancy was 20 years. (It is 72 today.)
How long did it take you to write Anthem? - ANSWER About three months.
How did you get the idea for the theme? - ANSWER I got the idea in my school days in Soviet Russia, when I heard all the vicious attacks on individualism, and asked myself what the world would be like if men lost the word "I."
What kind of religions existed in this society? - ANSWER The worship of the state, of the collective, was that society's religion.
Why did you choose the title Anthem? - ANSWER Because this story is my hymn to man's ego.
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