Well, Rand would likely have gotten the idea of the heroic master of nature from Nietzsche.

I have another article coming out on Rand's Objectivism, in which I go through some of the long speech at the end of Atlas Shrugged, to focus on my main disagreement with that libertarian philosophy.

Thanks for the link. I've come across that disparaging comparison of Rand's book to LOTR before. It's a zinger alright.