Ayn Rand and the World She Made - Anne C. Heller [171]
The two women worked together in a corner of Haydn’s large office, discussing changes in punctuation and wording. Copy-editing discussions with an author normally took a week or two, Krantz later said, but in this case they went on for several months. At first, Rand seriously frightened Krantz. The methodical thinker insisted on a logical reason for every change of period and comma; Krantz’s view was that punctuation depends on the eye and ear almost as much as on rules and reason. Often, the author would call across the room to Haydn, “Hiram, is Bert right?” “They were putting a great deal [of money] into the book, and for a long time it was very tense,” Krantz recalled in 1983. Gradually, the copy editor came to regard the famous author as “a little lady” much like herself: they were the same height, build, and coloring, and she guessed correctly that they shared a geographical and ethnic heritage. Moreover, working in close proximity with Rand, Krantz slowly concluded that the author herself was a frightened human being—and not just because of the imminent publication of her magnum opus. On visiting the O’Connors’ apartment for a working lunch, she was shocked to see the advocate of reason don a pair of heavy rubber gloves and scour the dishes in scalding hot water. “There are germs!” Rand exclaimed when Krantz questioned her. As the two became familiar with the details of each other’s lives, Rand nagged Krantz about the dangers of living in a risky neighborhood in the west Bronx, and Krantz noticed that the author, a proponent of the benevolent universe theory of life, sealed herself in her doorman-guarded apartment behind the usual steel locks. “The subway scared the hell out of her,” Krantz recalled, and Rand warned the copy editor not to use it. (“She must have thought I could afford to take a taxi to and from the office,” Krantz remarked, although Rand more probably had in mind a bus.) For a brief time, Rand attempted to convert Krantz to Objectivism, but Krantz politely demurred and Rand didn’t push. She still behaved with old-fashioned good manners, especially in professional relationships.
Like others over the years, Krantz observed that Rand was silent about her Jewish background. “It was funny to me, and to other people. She certainly never denied being Jewish, but somehow or other there seemed to be a certain evasiveness on her part.” The Random House staffer also remarked, with remembered consternation, that the O’Connors’ apartment was overrun by their unneutered male cat Frisco, named after Francisco d’Anconia. Frisco scratched the upholstered furniture to tatters, beat himself against the walls, and emitted a foul-smelling spray on furniture and rugs. The stench was terrible and permanent, Krantz recalled, as did other visitors to the apartment. When she asked why the O’Connors didn’t have the cat fixed, Rand replied that, unlike humans, cats cannot choose to go against nature or mold it to their wishes, and she would not interfere with them or force them. Krantz retorted that she had never heard a more irrational statement. “That made her angry,” Krantz recalled, “because I used the word ‘irrational.’” The copy editor was equally upset. “It was awful. She was such a brilliant woman. Her rationale was the big things of the world, but it’s the little things we live by.”
In the end, Krantz felt sorry for Rand. One day, Rand proudly showed Krantz some of Frank’s paintings. “I thought they were such schlock,” Krantz said. “She put on a front for her husband,” but “I thought he was a nebbish. I didn’t know how the hell he could live with her.”
Not “for one minute,” however, did Krantz or any other staff member at Random House doubt the author’s sincerity in everything she wrote and preached. The women remained on friendly terms for several years. But the self-made Russian messenger