I read “Atlas Shrugged” as an engineer interested in politics. I was impressed by how Ayn Rand presented characters there as vectors in the orthogonal space. In real life, we barely meet people so perfect or so flawed. Real people are much more complex, but it is useful to check how close they are to this or that stereotype (vector) defined in “Atlas Shrugged.”

Also, I read this book in my 50s. I already had my worldview well-aligned with that of Ayn Rand’s. Hence, this book was not a revelation; it was a creative take on what I have learned before independently.