DECEMBER 31, 2012

As the year ends, the promised December 2012 issue of The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies is on the way! It will be submitted to the printer very shortly, and should be in the hands of subscribers in January 2013.

The New Year brings with it a new publisher for the journal. As explained here:

The JARS Foundation and the Pennsylvania State University Press (PSUP) have entered into a formal collaborative agreement, commencing with the publication in 2013 of Volume 13, Number 1 (Issue 25), covering five years---and beyond.

Our Editorial Board will continue to solicit new articles and attract new writers, working closely with authors and peer readers toward the publication of essays of the finest quality and capacity for intellectual provocation. PSUP will take over the business end of the journal, while the Editorial Board will focus exclusively on the intellectual side of our project. PSUP will manage all aspects of distribution and subscription fulfillment in both print and online journal editions. Our arrangement with PSUP will also provide a more systematic framework for quality control, which will structure our workflow for the submission, double-blind peer review, and tracking of articles as they make their way to publication. And once our editorial work is done, we will submit approved, completed essays to the PSUP production department, which will provide a second level of copyediting and the typesetting of all content.

PSUP will set all institutional and individual pricing, which includes print-only, online-only, or print-and-online subscriptions, inside and outside the United States. There will be options for article downloads on a newly developed website. Indeed, a robust online edition of the journal will have the added, indispensable features and services on which the scholarly community relies, including XML codes on all files, which will be used to produce printable PDFs, as well as PDFs and html files for the web, all fully searchable.

PSUP has partnered with Project Muse and with JSTOR (both its Current Scholarship Program and back issue archive), making possible the extensive digital dissemination of PSUP journals. JARS will be potentially available to thousands of new readers from private and public, domestic and international institutions, corporations, and agencies.

The most important aspect of our collaboration, however, is our plan for the preservation of the journal and its trailblazing content. PSUP participates in CrossRef and all of its journals are now archived at Stanford�s CLOCKSS (Controlled Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe). In essence, JARS, including all of its back issues dating from its 1999 inception, will be a part of the dark archive at Stanford that will preserve its content for the use of scholars and historians in perpetuity.

Penn State Press is already advertising on its site the New Look for a New JARS! Here's a sneak peek at the new look:

And because the journal now has a robust online edition, we have added an E-ISSN to our long-time ISSN:

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number, ISSN 1526-1018; E-ISSN 2169-7132

But let's not get ahead of ourselves!

A New JARS, the last pre-PSUP issue, will be on its way to subscribers shortly. And with it, comes an Expanding Editorial Board and an Expanding Board of Advisors.

I will be posting the Preface I've written in a couple of weeks; for now, it gives me great pleasure to introduce our newly constituted Editorial Board and Board of Advisors.

The Editorial Board now has four editors; the Associate Editor, Robert L. Campbell, has been elevated to the formal Editorial Board, which now includes these four editors:

Robert L. Campbell
Stephen Cox
Roderick T. Long
Chris Matthew Sciabarra

And our Board of Advisors, which suffered the loss of two founding members over the last few years (economist Larry Sechrest and philosopher John Hospers), now boasts six new members and six founding members. I'll be providing additional information on our full Board of Advisors in the coming weeks. The new members are represented below with an asterisk (*).

David T. Beito (History, University of Alabama) *
Peter J. Boettke (Economics and Philosophy, George Mason University) *
Susan Love Brown (Anthropology, Florida Atlantic University) *
Douglas J. Den Uyl (Philosophy, The Liberty Fund)
Mimi Reisel Gladstein (English and Theatre Arts, University of Texas, El Paso)
Hannes H�lmsteinn Gissurarson (Politics, University of Iceland) *
Robert Hessen (History, Emeritus, The Hoover Institution)
Steven Horwitz (Economics, St. Lawrence University) *
Lester H. Hunt (Philosophy, University of Wisconsin)
Eric Mack (Philosophy, Tulane University)
David N. Mayer (Law and History, Capital University Law School) *
Douglas B. Rasmussen (Philosophy, St. John's University)

Finally, here is the cover to our newest issue (December 2012), which features all-new content plus our year-end Index, and a Master Author Index of every article that has appeared in JARS over its first dozen volumes!

The issue includes the following essays:

Preface: Expanding Boards, Expanding Horizons - Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Sex and the Egoist: Measuring Ayn Rand's Fiction Against Her Philosophy - Emily J. Barr

Taking Pieces of Rand with Them: Ayn Rand's Literary Influence - Robert Powell

Ayn Rand's Objectivist Virtues as the Foundation for Morality and Success in Business - Edward W. Younkins

Private War: Objectivist Political Philosophy and the Privatization of Military Force - Martin van Wetten

Ayn Rand Nation - Neil Parille

Check out the abstracts for these articles here and the contributor biographies here.

Watch this space for more information about our newest issue in the coming weeks. Till then, Happy New Year!

Song of the Day: Call Me Maybe features the words and music of Tavish Crowe, Josh Ramsay, and Carly Rae Jepson, a young Canadian singer and songwriter who delivers the most infectious song of 2012. It provides what was probably "the year's most gripping hook," making it "one of the most irrefutable teen-pop songs in history," as New York Daily News music critic Jim Farber attests. It also sported an adorable music video with a gay twist [YouTube link], but before too long, as Farber reminds us, everybody got in on the act, from the college frat boys of Ramapo Kappa Sigma to the Tennessee "Call Me Gaybe" boys to the cast from "Glee" to the U.S. Olympics Swimming Team [YouTube links]. It's a song that should be on any year-end countdown. Tonight we'll be counting down till the ball drops in Times Square. Have a happy, healthy, and safe New Year's Eve!

DECEMBER 30, 2012

Song of the Day: A Christmas Carol (aka "Scrooge"; "Main Title") [YouTube clip at that link], composed by Richard Addinsell, who mixes the sounds of a traditional carol ("Hark! The Herald Angels Sing") with a grim theme of beckoning menace, foreshadowing the fate-altering tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, played in this 1951 film by the utterly superb Alastair Sim (of all the cinematic treatments of this timeless Charles Dickens tale, this one is my favorite). Addinsell wrote one of my all-time favorite popular concertos ("Warsaw Concerto"). And he's in fine form here too. There are one or two neat videos on YouTube that provide an entertaining side-by-side comparison of the various Scrooges portrayed in film over the past century or so. This concludes my mini-tribute to music from Christmas-oriented films, "in keeping with the situation" of this holiday season.

DECEMBER 29, 2012

Song of the Day: It's a Wonderful Life ("Main Title") composed by Dmitri Tiomkin, is one of the most recognizable themes of all holiday movies. Though initially released to lukewarm reception, this 1946 Frank Capra film became a classic over the years as it was shown again and again on television especially around the holidays. It is one of my all-time favorite movies with a stupendous cast, led by Jimmy Stewart, whose character learns, through the lightness and darkness of his experiences, that his actions (like the actions of every individual) have ever-widening ripple effects on the people with whom he comes into contact (and even some people he'll never meet). And I love the Tiomkin score. You can watch the movie online on YouTube; check out the opening theme in the first minute or so.

DECEMBER 28, 2012

Song of the Day: The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima ("Main Title" / "Miracle of the Sun"), composed by Max Steiner, opens the 1952 film, which tells the story of Lucia dos Santos, who claimed to have seen visions of the Virgin Mary in 1917, in Portugal. Check out the film on YouTube, especially the opening minutes, where Steiner's main title is heard, and the "Miracle of the Sun" (starting around 1:35 on...). The legendary composer's score received an Academy Award nomination.

DECEMBER 27, 2012

Song of the Day: The Song of Bernadette ("Prelude"), composed by Alfred Newman, opens the reverential 1943 film, starring Jennifer Jones, who won a Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Bernadette Soubirous, who claimed to have seen the Virgin Mary in Lourdes, France. The opening theme has hints of Newman's later theme for "The Robe." Check out the film on YouTube, especially the opening minute or so, where this lovely theme is first heard. Newman won the Oscar for Best Original Score for this soundtrack.

DECEMBER 26, 2012

Song of the Day: Miracle on 34th Street ("Main Theme") [YouTube clip at that link], composed by Cyril J. Mockridge, opens the joyous 1947 film of the same name, starring an absolutely magical Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle. Gwenn won the Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and the film won Oscars for Best Writing, Original Story and Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay, as well. Check out a suite from the film on YouTube!

DECEMBER 25, 2012

Song of the Day: Rise, Ye Shepherds, music by Franz Waxman, lyrics by Mack David, is a wonderfully melodic carol original to the score for the 1962 film, "Taras Bulba," starring Yul Brynner and Tony Curtis. The entire film is on YouTube here; this rare selection is at 26:17. Merry Christmas to All (on that "Norad Tracks Santa" link, check out, especially, the U.S. Air Force of Liberty's jazzy rendition of "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" when Santa hits the Northeast)!

DECEMBER 12, 2012

Song of the Day: The Dirty Dozen ("Main Theme") [YouTube clip at that link], composed by Frank De Vol, is the percussive-heavy military theme to the memorable all-star 1967 film. Today is the last repeating date [12-12-12 12:12] of this century, and the cleanest of the 'dirty dozens' that we will see for a millennium.

DECEMBER 05, 2012

Song of the Day: Bossa Nova U.S.A., composed by Dave Brubeck, is the sweet lyrical title track from the composer's 1963 album featuring the great jazzman's classic quartet, with alto saxophonist Paul Desmond. Brubeck, who passed away today, was one of the greatest innovators in modern jazz. Listen to this song on YouTube.