Ayn Rand Institute president Yaron Brook applauded the milestone, noting that Ayn Rand’s popularity is well-deserved. “No other author has such a powerful and compelling message that is so accessible to so many readers. Ayn Rand addresses fundamental questions that affect each of our lives, and she offers engaging, real-world answers to those questions.”

The Ayn Rand page is operated by the Ayn Rand Institute.

Atlas Shrugged is now on the shelves of 1,100 Target stores, demonstrating impressive marketability for a 53-year-old novel. And a segment of a recent Glenn Beck program dedicated to the novel has seen the book leap up the Amazon bestseller list. It is currently ranked in the top 20.

Atlas Shrugged is a compelling mystery, but it is also a story with a profound and original philosophy that provides answers to the problems we’re facing in our world right now. Many people feel inspired after reading the novel, and that is a major reason why the book is still in such high demand.

Beck and Brook discussed the parallels between events in Atlas Shrugged and events perpetrated by our government today. In one segment, Beck put the names of three legislative bills on the blackboard and asked his audience to guess which one was real and which two were from Atlas Shrugged.

Dr. Brook explained that the role of fundamental philosophical ideas is crucial to understanding how we got where we are today in America. He singled out multiculturalism and subjectivism as two main ideas being taught in our schools that paralyze our student’s ability to think properly and integrate ideas.

Atlas Shrugged, which was ranked 74 on Amazon’s bestseller list as of the program’s airing, has jumped as high as number 11 since the Beck show aired, and is currently ranked 22. “Pretty amazing for a 53-year-old novel,” Brook said.

“The explosion in sales of ‘Atlas Shrugged’ more than a half century after its initial publication is truly remarkable,” said Dr. Yaron Brook, president of the Ayn Rand Institute. “Annual sales of ‘Atlas Shrugged’ have been increasing for decades to a level never seen in Ayn Rand’s lifetime.

“People are discovering the prescience of Ayn Rand’s writing. They’re seeing the policies of ‘Atlas Shrugged’ villains Wesley Mouch and Cuffy Meigs acted out by our government officials today. They’re looking for answers on how to stop government intrusion in our lives. ‘Atlas Shrugged’ provides those answers, and many more.”

First published in 1957, Atlas Shrugged continues to draw media attention, including a recent episode of “Stossel” on Fox Business Network dedicated to the novel. More than 7,000,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged have been sold since it was first published.

The program will air at 8 p.m. ET and feature interviews with leading Objectivist intellectuals including Dr. Yaron Brook, president of the Ayn Rand Center.

The year 2009 was unprecedented in media attentionof Atlas Shrugged and the book sold a record number of copies.

With prominent national media figures like John Stossel taking an interest in Atlas Shrugged, it looks like the momentum from 2009 will carry on into the New Year.

The Ayn Rand Institute announced a new record in submissions for its annual Atlas Shrugged essay contest. ARI received more than 4,000 entries this year, more than twice as many as last year’s record.

ARI credits the surge in essay contest submissions to the recent boom in Atlas Shrugged sales, along with the continued growth of ARI’s free books to teachers program. The ARI essay contest is part of a larger educational program that encourages high school and college educators to use the book in their classrooms.  ARI has given teachers more than a hundred thousand copies of “Atlas Shrugged” in the last two years.

Open to 12th graders and both graduate- and undergraduate-level college students, the Atlas Shrugged essay contest requires contestants to write on one of several topics dealing with characters and themes in the novel. The contest is designed to promote critical thinking and writing skills. Essays are judged on both style and content. The top prize awarded to the contest winner is $10,000, with multiple semifinalist and finalist awards ranging from $50 to $2,000.

As Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, noted, “Considering that in the first half of 2008 Penguin shipped about 85,000 copies, the spectacular jump to 300,000 copies in the first half of 2009 represents an increase of almost 250 percent in gross sales of Atlas Shrugged!

Reports from industry sources indicate that more copies of Atlas Shrugged were sold in book stores and by online resellers in the first half of 2009 than in all of 2008, when a new all-time annual record was established with more than 200,000 copies of the novel sold in the United States.

“The spike in sales of Atlas Shrugged more than a half century after its initial publication is truly remarkable,” Dr. Brook pointed out. “Annual sales of Atlas Shrugged have been increasing for decades to a level not seen even in Ayn Rand’s lifetime. Sales of the U.S. paperback editions averaged around 70,000 copies a year in the 1980s, and doubled to about 140,000 copies a year in the current decade. And the pace of sales has been accelerating recently, reaching an all-time high during the novel’s 50th anniversary in 2007, surpassing this mark in 2008, and on course to set another record in 2009.”

Almost 7,000,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged have been sold since it was first published in 1957.

Shortly after Independence Day, new free-standing floor displays of Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, first published 52 years ago, will be placed in more than 850 bookstores across the United States. Borders will display the novel’s trade edition at 520 of its stores and Waldenbooks will feature the mass market paperback edition at 336 of its stores. Thousands of copies of Atlas Shrugged will be on display.

Barnes & Noble also had copies of Atlas Shrugged for sale in special floor displays in most of its bookstores from late May into early June.

According to Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, “This is the most prominent and widespread display for this novel in all of its publishing history. It is particularly remarkable because it comes more than a half century after its initial publication.

“The fact that the largest bookstore chains in America have chosen to make such a prominent display of Atlas Shrugged is a testimony to the current and growing interest in Ayn Rand’s novels and ideas, and an encouraging sign for America’s future.

“As Americans confront the scary growth of government control over their lives and the economy, they need, more than ever, to learn about Ayn Rand’s conception of a new morality of rational self-interest and her unprecedented defense of freedom and individual rights.”

The Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights and the media have been reporting on the surge in sales of Ayn Rand’s classic novel Atlas Shrugged over the last six months. Not surprisingly, sales of the Atlas Shrugged audio book are also making impressive gains.

According to Blackstone Audio, one of the publishers of the full text audio edition of Atlas Shrugged, 16,000 audio copies of the novel were sold in the first five months of 2009, compared to around 20,000 in all of 2008. “This is a huge increase,” noted Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute. “This year audio copies of Atlas Shrugged are selling at about twice the rate as last year.”

Reports from trade sources have indicated that book purchases of Atlas Shrugged have also spiked recently, having tripled in the first four months of 2009 compared to the first four months of 2008. “The tripling in sales of Atlas Shrugged is remarkable,” said Dr. Brook, “especially considering that in 2008 a new all-time record in annual sales of the novel was established with more than 200,000 copies sold in the United States.”

More than 6,500,000 copies of Atlas Shrugged have been sold to date.

“Given the striking similarities between the plot-line of the book and the events of our day, more Americans are reading and listening to Atlas Shrugged than ever before,” said Yaron Brook. “Hopefully, they will find in Atlas Shrugged the principled solutions to the problems we face today.”

Each school year ARI distributes promotional flyers that offer free classroom sets of Ayn Rand’s novels to English and language arts teachers, department heads and principals, as well as selected counselors and high school administrators. “This offer,” said Marilee Dahl, ARI’s Education department manager, “is available to both public and private high schools throughout the United States and Canada.”

“Each teacher who requests these books,” explained Ms. Dahl, “receives a classroom set of the novels, along with a teacher’s guide, lesson plans and information about ARI’s annual Anthem, Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged essay contests. We also offer phone and e-mail support to teachers, as needed, to facilitate their teaching of the books in their classes. The response has been fantastic and a very positive sign for America’s future.”

More information on the Free Books to Teachers program is available at the Ayn Rand Institute’s Web site.