Curiosity In Ayn Rand's Anthem

To begin, Albert Einstein once said, “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” Curiosity, a desire to know or learn something, must exist in in this world in order for new things to be discovered. In the novel, Anthem, written by Ayn Rand, the male protagonist, Equality 7-2521, lives in a dystopian society in which everyone are forced to learn and think the way the World Council of Scholars want them to. The World Council of Scholars are the smartest people who dictate everything in this society. Equality 7-2521 begins to break away from this conformity, beginning with his encounter with an underground tunnel where he learns of electric light; then he presents his discovery to the World Council of Scholars. The rejection of his discovery leads him to the Uncharted Forest, an area around the city where it is illegal to go, being followed by Liberty 5-3000, his girlfriend, and resulting in finding a house from the Unmentionable Times, or times before the society was created. There are manuscripts from the Unmentionable Times inside that house, that

Someone might want to know their reason for living, and with wanting to find that reason, their goal may be accomplished. In this case, Equality 7-2521 had found a home in the Uncharted Forest that has many manuscripts from the Unmentionable Times, which he reads and learns the word “I.” He now expresses his feelings with “I” saying, “I wished to know the meaning of things. I am the meaning” (Rand 94). Equality 7-2521 was very eager to read those manuscripts and learn of the word that he felt was missing, so with his wanting and gain of new knowledge, he discovered his self-identity. With his newly found self-identity, he learns that he is his own person that lives for himself, and not for a group of people. In brief, someone’s self-identity is realized with the drive of their