Anthem: Chapter 12 Summary & Analysis

Equality 7-2521 explains that he first encountered the word “I” in the first book he read in the house he discovered. Upon understanding what this word meant, he dropped the book and burst into tears. He cried both because he felt as though he had achieved salvation, and because he pitied the rest of mankind. The “curse” he had felt while a member of society was in fact his greatest attribute, and all of his transgressions were in fact his noblest features. He now comes to understand that the individualistic spirit of man cannot be defeated even by centuries of oppression.

After reading for days, Equality 7-2521 summons the Golden One and tells her what he has learned. The first words she says to him are “I love you.” He responds by telling her that it is improper to live without names, and that they should pick names for themselves. From his readings, he chooses the name Prometheus, after the figure from Greek mythology who stole fire from the Gods and brought it to mankind. Prometheus suffered for this offense, as all who bear this sort of burden must.

Equality 7-2521 has also read about Gaea, the mythological earth-mother. He gives the Golden One this name, saying that she will be the mother of a new race of gods. She accepts the name.

Equality 7-2521, now Prometheus, sees his future clearly before him. He is the successor to the Saint of the pyre—the man who was executed for speaking the Unspeakable Word. He will live in this house, earn his food through his own struggles, and earn his knowledge through his own study. Over time, this will allow him to replicate the achievements of the Unmentionable Times in ways that are impossible to his brothers, who remain chained to the weakest members of society.

Prometheus has learned that his light bulb relies on something the men from the Unmentionable Times called Electricity. He understands that the house was powered by this technology and will endeavor to repair the wiring and light fixtures. He will use his understanding to protect his house with wires and light, and his mind will be his defense against others.

Gaea is pregnant with a child, and Prometheus says he will teach his son to live as a man and speak “I” proudly. After Prometheus has read the books in the house and established his home, he will return to the City where he was born and seek out his comrades, like International 4-8818. Prometheus will try to convince these people to come to his homestead with him, and together they will “write the first chapter in the new history of man.”

“Freedom,” to Prometheus, simply requires that man be free from his brothers. At first, men were enslaved by Gods, then by kings, and then by attachments of family or race. Over time, though, this enslavement was broken when mankind realized that each individual had inalienable rights independent of his fellow man. However, when people began to worship the concept of “We,” they lost these achievements and became weak and spineless.

Prometheus ponders how such greatness in human spirit could have faded to such cowardliness, but knows from his time in the City that men can willingly bring horrible misfortunes upon themselves. He imagines that there may have been a courageous group of men who resisted collectivism, and salutes their heroic struggle. He vows to continue this struggle, to prove that the spirit of man can never be broken, despite whatever darkness it is forced to endure. Prometheus’s mountaintop fortress will be the center of a new society that will one day reclaim the world from the collectivist Councils. He will fight for the freedom, dignity, and honor of mankind. There is one word, Prometheus concludes, that will never die. That sacred word, he says, is “ego.”