Allan Gotthelf - Involvement With Ayn Rand and The Objectivist Movement

Involvement With Ayn Rand and The Objectivist Movement

Gotthelf was introduced to Ayn Rand's thought in 1961 when, at the age of 18, he first read Atlas Shrugged. He attended many lecture courses and question periods at the Nathaniel Branden Institute, where he worked as an usher (and in other capacities), and where in 1962 he first met Ayn Rand. For over fifteen years, he had many opportunities for sustained philosophical discussion with Rand; for instance, he was an active participant in Rand's famous 1969-71 Workshops on Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, and subsequent smaller workshops at Rand's apartment. He was Rand's choice for indexer of her collections, The Virtue of Selfishness and Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal. As an undergraduate at Brooklyn College in 1963, Gotthelf founded one of the early college-based "Ayn Rand Clubs," under whose auspices Rand herself lectured to an audience of over 1000. It was suggestions from both Gotthelf and Leonard Peikoff which motivated Rand to write her extended monograph on concepts, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology.

Since 1964, he has spoken on Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, countless times at colleges, universities, and private groups throughout the U.S., Canada, Bermuda, Europe, and Japan. He is the author of On Ayn Rand, still the best-selling book in the Wadsworth Philosophers series, and he co-authored (with Gregory Salmieri) the entry on Rand in the Dictionary of Modern American Philosophers. He is co-editor (also with Salmieri) of the forthcoming Wiley-Blackwell volume, Ayn Rand: A Companion to Her Works and Thought, expected out in mid 2013, and has published two essays in Robert Mayhew's Essays on Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged: "Galt's Speech in Five Sentences (and Forty Questions)" and "A Note on Dagny's 'Final Choice'."

As mentioned above, Gotthelf was one of the founding members of The Ayn Rand Society, and holds its highest office. He is currently the editor (with James G. Lennox as associate editor) of the series, Ayn Rand Society Philosophical Studies, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. The first volume, Metaethics, Egoism, and Virtue: Studies in Ayn Rand's Normative Theory, was published in early 2011. The second volume, Concepts and Their Role in Knowledge: Reflections on Objectivist Epistemology, is scheduled for publication in mid-2013. The first volume includes his essay "The Choice to Value (1990)"; the second volume leads off with his essay "Ayn Rand's Theory of Concepts: Rethinking Abstraction and Essence."