Audra Hilse“What was she like?”
Ayn Rand’s long-time student and intellectual heir, Dr. Leonard Peikoff, received this question frequently. His original answer was “Read her novels; she was everything their creator would have to be.” After the first edition of Letters of Ayn Rand was published in 1995, Peikoff was able to add to his answer, “Read her letters.”
More than twenty years later, editor Michael S. Berliner decided that it was time to revisit the Letters project. Archival work on Rand’s papers had unearthed additional correspondence, and he saw an opportunity to expand both the selection of letters and the commentary that situates them.
We are pleased to announce that the result of this effort, an expanded second edition of Letters of Ayn Rand, is now available as an eBook from Penguin Random House. This edition presents the complete transcripts, including more than fifty newly added letters, restored passages previously cut for space, and extensive new commentary by Berliner. Altogether, the added material expands the book by roughly thirty percent.
Rand’s letters cover a wide range of subjects: extended philosophical discussion, publishing and business matters, answers to fan letters, and accounts of her daily life shared with friends and family. For readers seeking a deeper understanding of Ayn Rand in her own words, the expanded Letters of Ayn Rand offers a uniquely comprehensive resource.
Agustina Vergara Cid
Brandon Lisi
Shoshana Milgram
