(I don’t find literary analysis boring at all!) It’s been long enough since I read the book that I don’t exactly remember all the bits, and it also makes sense that different themes could resonate for different people. I think your interpretation is probably closer to what Ayn Rand intended – she obviously doesn’t think of Eddie as an antagonist, exactly, since he has positive traits and her antagonists generally don’t. I agree, and probably she would agree, that Eddie was able to do more good by “finding his Dagny” (I mean, this is what I was trying to do at the time!) That being said, I...don’t remember having the impression at all that he would have been welcome in Galt’s Gulch, even if he had decided to pin his loyalty on Dagny herself rather than the railroad; I don’t remember him even having an opportunity to find out that she was leaving or why. (I could just be misremembering this, though.)
(I don’t find literary analysis boring at all!) It’s been long enough since I read the book that I don’t exactly remember all the bits, and it also makes sense that different themes could resonate for different people. I think your interpretation is probably closer to what Ayn Rand intended – she obviously doesn’t think of Eddie as an antagonist, exactly, since he has positive traits and her antagonists generally don’t. I agree, and probably she would agree, that Eddie was able to do more good by “finding his Dagny” (I mean, this is what I was trying to do at the time!) That being said, I...don’t remember having the impression at all that he would have been welcome in Galt’s Gulch, even if he had decided to pin his loyalty on Dagny herself rather than the railroad; I don’t remember him even having an opportunity to find out that she was leaving or why. (I could just be misremembering this, though.)