
Howard Roark: In Praise of the Self Speech from the Fountainhead (1943) - tzhenghao
https://www.panarchy.org/rand/roark.1943.html
======
hirundo
> Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was
> probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. He was
> considered an evildoer who had dealt with a demon mankind dreaded.

Hate or love her, Rand had a powerful way with words. You can admit that and
still thinks she was the evildoer. By her influence she was one of the
greatest expository writers of her generation. She brilliantly wrapped
treatises on economics and philosophy in sugar pills of fiction. For good or
ill, Howard Roark is among the great literary characters of the twentieth
century.

~~~
russellbeattie
Nah. Her exposition is mediocre at best. What she did was simply give her
readers a rationale for their innate selfishness and lack of empathy, wrapped
in flowery platitudes. Those that are naturally self-centered read her work
and the underlying message of radical egocentrism speaks to them. But since
it's such an abhorrent message, they justify their attraction to it by
claiming Rand was a compelling writer. She really wasn't.

What I guess you can say is that being a hypocrite and narcissist herself,
Rand knew her audience quite well and wrote accordingly. There's a lot that
can be learned from that.

------
ykevinator
That book was great until Howard roark broke his quiet dignity to brag in a
speech. It amazes me how bad the ending of this book is.

------
fegu
Much can be said of Ayn Rand and her books. That aside, I find the money
speech of Atlas Shrugged [1] far better at conveying the point than the self
speech of The Fountainhead. 1:
[https://www.capitalismmagazine.com/2002/08/franciscos-
money-...](https://www.capitalismmagazine.com/2002/08/franciscos-money-
speech/)

~~~
xiphias2
What's really interesting for me in Atlas Shrugged is the way people are going
back to sound money by leaving the hyperinflationary fiat system. When I read
the book, I thought that gold is just some symbol/metaphor, but not something
important. Since then I learned more about the way money works and realized
that it wasn't a metaphor at all, and I'm seeing how history repeats itself,
and people haven't learned from the mistakes that were made 80 years ago.

