The Light of Hope Turning On

“It is a sin to write this.”(Chapter 1) These first few words have pulled so many readers into Anthem, only to be suddenly trapped inside Ayn Rand’s novel, too captured by her words to bother escaping. We see a world that could be ours, a world full of repression and sins that can emerge out of our world today in this small and impressionable novella. We see how far one change can go throughout the world of Anthem and in this world there are frightening sins, such as writing your own thoughts or even your own will. The thought that the world that has become could be so simply destroyed by the embellished value of ‘We’ is an overpowering thought in itself. Though the main point of this novelette is a warning against communism and the importance of individuality, though another point is made which puts this novella in a different light. Anthem shows hope more than anything else; it shows that there is hope where most would think there is none, a hope that is world changing. Ayn Rand is an author that gives us the hope of redemption, of individuality, and of learning from what could be and it is these hopes that make Anthem such an inspiring novel.
The first hope Ayn Rand gives is through redemption. Redemption of being able to fix what has happened in this novel, such as the loss of the now common light bulb. At first Equality 7-2521 stumbles upon a tunnel of the Unmentionable Times and unknowingly starts his journey to the redemption of the world that has become. At first Equality seeks redemption for the sins he thinks he has committed against his society, though it is his society that needs to be redeemed for their sins of repression and he is the one who shall bring his society to its redemption. As Anthem continues Equality is discovered missing and is whipped to divulge information. Though Equality gives nothing away to the two judges about his tunnel and ‘glass-box’ he saw it as a punishment for sins he thought he had committed. He thought it now fair to present his ‘glass-box’ to the World Council, for he had already paid his price of redemption to his society. Though his plan goes a fowl and he is rejected by the Council, he feels as if he has to run away into the Uncharted Forest of the Unmentionable Times, though it seems as if he is forced, this is the beginnings of him bringing back hope. Equality still has the hope to redeem the world even though he is away from his society, first by being reunited with Liberty 5-3000, his love, and of finding the abandoned home where he can learn of things his society never dreamed of learning because they had already forgotten it. Throughout Anthem hope of redemption is shown in ways that seem purposeless though everything serves a purpose.
The next hope that Ayn Rand displays in her novel is the hope of individuality even in a suppressive society like Equality’s. The fact that Equality shows signs of individuality throughout his childhood proves that even in a society that begins repressing individualism at birth a personality can still be prominent. “We are one in all and all in one. There are no men but only the great WE, One, invisible and forever.”(Chapter 1) Throughout childhood, the children of this society had that motto pounded into their heads and taught to think as ‘We’ rather than ‘I’ and that caused the lack of response as far as advancement and individuality goes, though there are the few who challenge the way they were raised to think, such as Saint Pyro who was burned to death and Equality who follows Saint Pyro’s example. Due to past experiences, such as with Saint Pyro, the society punishes those who differ to their pre-chosen path, causing people to recoil from the individuality that they would originally posses as a right of birth, such as when Equality yearns for the lack of understanding that his fellow brothers have and he wished he did not understand what he had done. Another example of the hope of individuality is that though Equality is taught to never favor anything or anyone he grows a favoritism of classes and jobs he wished to perform. He was able to suppress his initial teachings and act upon the initial instinct of human beings to favor one thing over another.
The last hope that Ayn Rand sends through her novella is the hope that we can prevent a society like this from ever happening. If there was no hope from saving the world from this predicted fate, no one would have dared to fight against the terrible force of ‘We’, though it clearly says in this book that people did fight against the impending doom that ‘We’ brought about. A way to prevent this horrible fate is to follow by its example, teaching children at a young age how individuality is an important quality of human beings. If we stress the greatness of individuality, what will be able to suppress it. ‘We’ was able to conquer ‘I’ because ‘I’ had lost its true meaning or had only left its negatives to be seen. Yes, individualism is a dangerous thing to tamper with and there could be many negative affects, but if ‘I’ took over just as ‘We’ did in this novel, isn’t taking the risk to find the balance between these two better than never trying to find any balance and just living with one or another? The people who had brought this fate upon the society were the ones who didn’t head the warnings of ‘We’ becoming too overpowering and had given up hope of finding the balance between ‘We’ and ‘I’. So Ayn Rand gives us the hope and warning to find the balance and not let either one control the other.
Hope shines brightly throughout Anthem. Whether through redemption, individuality, or prevention hope is a main theme in. Seeing the hope is always more difficult than finding the reasons to give up hope, which is why most would see no hope to speak of, but it was always there waiting to be revealed and to bring the world to its rightful place. If we do not venture to find the truth as Equality did, what can we ever learn? As long as we continue questioning what society says, we will never buy into such a society as in Anthem. Though I am scared to think of what kind of society ‘I’ would bring if it conquered all. Yet as long as we can find the ‘light’ that some societies may try to turn off we can still conquer such a society as Equality’s. All we have to do is turn back on the ‘light’.