I read the book long back and again read it in the last few weeks ..wanted to try and capture the essence of the book..very difficult , but i tried ..a lot of you might not read this completely ,but some might ..only read it if you have patience and time ..anyway , i wanted to write it ..
Fountainhead weaves the main characters around the philosophy of objectivism, which even now several consider as a radical philosophy. The novel is about how individualism is a corner stone of human life .The novel revolves around the central character Howard Roarke his struggle in system defined world ruled by collectivism and the heroine Dominique.
There are 3 more characters. .shall write about them first , they are around this world in plenty..
- Ellsworth Toohey who is a columnist and a cheat. He represents people who want to rule the mob but using means of inducing guilts, altruism, degrading self respect and promoting mob thinking.
- Peter Keating needs somebody to help him make decisions as he is always unsure. His insecurity leads him to committing sins as he moves on the ladder of success, he ruthlessly tramples on many people to reach his objective.
- Gail Wyand , who is media baron and pulls the string. He sells and creates news , what people want to read . Interestingly what he sells in news papers is applicable today too, People even today love masala .Ironically in novel he runs two ads on his front page. One requested readers to donate money for broke scientist who is trying to invent some phenomenal thing while another ad does requested readers to donate money for an unmarried pregnant lady whose boyfriend was goon and gets killed by police. People respond to both requests. Scientist gets hundred odd dollars , while the lady gets thousand dollars . News today is forced to sell masalas , scandals and such stuffs because they sell easily .
For Howard his work is his passion and he feels most committed to do what is right in his work. His motivation for working and living is his own ego, and he practically ignores the ideas of others. Roark has a self-confidence that Dominique finds irresistible. He inspires confidence and fear in people because they know he is right and he will not stop till he has completed his tasks, he has a lot of followers .Even then the mercurial world is sometimes too happy to celebrate the fall of a hero, and he gives up power and riches for what he felt was correct –for they all feared his ideas. Completely unpretentious by nature, he neither humbles nor gratifies himself. His work speaks for him. He is neither driven by compliments nor is flattered by a compliment. He does not feel too much a part of the mercurial world and its celebrations and idle chatter.
However, the world around him misinterprets the ego and therefore fears it for they know it will succeed .He remembers and misses Dominique.Dominique is his mirror ego .They found each other by chance, attracted by a supernatural force, move together, love each other which brings a lot of pleasure and also brings pain , they walk separate paths for a while and are pulled back together. She understands his potential and the power they can create together.
Dominique recognizes man's capacity for achievement, and this is the only thing she loves. Because she reveres man at his highest and best, she loathes most members of the human race, who fall below man's potential and are non-performers. When she sees the manipulative Peter Keatings, the power-hungry Ellsworth Tooheys, and the masses that prefer Keating's work to Roark's, it fills her with despair. She is committed to the facts, to truth, to her mind's most honest judgment — not to the opinions of others. Dominique is a thinker. The willingness to think for herself is what enables and demonstrates that though independence is not a guarantee of arriving at the truth, it provides an individual with a self-regulating method.
Their relation is quiet complex one which starts with instant attraction and instinct, becomes intense, proceeds with seeking power on different roads. They are afar but their thoughts and actions are similar, though they pursue it differently, and finally they come together and the relation evolves into soul mates.
In the end Howard Roark triumphs, with Dominique by his side standing at the top of the masterpiece he designed.
The novel usually jolts people who feel the idea or philosophy behind the book, Objectivism. But as one thinks deeply and rationally it makes perfect sense. The influence of the social herd clouds the identity, as does the normally divided mind of man.We associate with the most convenient acceptable human ,social form. Only when we seek the deeper consciousness within, do we move to the wider truth.When we look at history, it is those people who challenged big objectives and progressed on their path regardless of who was with them charted the progress of humanity to a better future. Charles Darwin, Galileo, Isaac Newton, Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Bill Gates, Gorbachev, are some of the examples.
