Question Commander - Gabi Campos

Anthem by Ayn Rand
Parts 7 & 8


"Why do the scholars value the candle so much?"


In chapter seven, when our protagonist brings their discovery of the House of Scholars. Each Scholar has something to say about how it is useless because it wasn't done collectively, not everyone agrees with its power, etc. One of the arguments used by the council is that the glass box would end the Department of Candles and the candles are a great boon to mankind. However why are the candles so important? I cannot think of anything that could be the answer to this, except that maybe the scholars do not wish to turn to electricity, perhaps thinking that soon they will depend on it like the society we live in today. In the novel, being the "Unmentionable Times", this makes sense because Equality 7-2125 states in the beginning of the novel that they were not to know anything about the Unmentionable Times, however I am not 100% sure.

Source

This image of a candle allows us to see how a candle doesn't offer as much light as a lightbulb does. While we don't know how bright the glass box was, I doubt that the candle was brighter, this is yet another reason that compliments my theory that The House of Scholars does not wish to bring electricity back into the society.

"Do the monsters the protagonist talked about in the beginning truly exist or are they just tales?"

Equality 7-2125 has spent an entire night in the forest but there has been nothing said about the mysterious creatures that lurk in the woods, spying on them through trees, as silent as a rock. I wonder if they are merely tales meant to keep men out of the forest, but for what reason? Is there something in the forest that the House of Scholars does not want anyone to know about? But if so, than why does Equality 7-2125 mention that the Scholars would not dare enter the forest, who's name is even the "Uncharted Forest". So are there really monsters in the forest? Is something there that people aren't supposed to know about? Or is it something else? Perhaps a border between a city and another?

Source

I chose this image to represent the paragraph above because in my head, this is what I believe the uncharted forest looks like, dark in the beginning but then it turns into something breathtakingly beautiful and like every other forest when it comes to books, hiding several secrets.