"Anthem" by Ayn Rand is a dystopian novella written in 1937 and first published in 1938. In a future Dark Age where individuality has been erased and technology is controlled, a young man named Equality 7-2521 commits a forbidden act: secret scientific research. When his transgression is discovered, he flees into the wilderness with Liberty 5-3000, the woman he loves. Together, they seek to rediscover what their society has destroyed—the concept of the individual self.