Rand depicted Roark as being everything a young architect was supposed to be: brilliant, self-absorbed, creative, headstrong, invincible. The plot's credibility was due to extensive research done by the author, who worked for six months without pay as a secretary in the office of New York architect Ely Jacques Kahn, solely to learn about the field. From the beginning it captivated America's architects, who thirsted for any mention of the profession in the popular press. Rand intended the book to be a character study, 'The Fountainhead' soon took on a life of its own as a tale about architecture. 'It's about Roark against the world and about the workings of that thing in the world which opposes him.'īut even if Ms. 'The book is not about architecture,' she wrote. Rand explained how the subject of architecture fit into her portrayal. In notes made to herself while writing 'The Fountainhead,' Ms. 'I intend to have clients in order to build.' 'I don't intend to build in order to have clients,' he states early in the book.

Because he was fictional, his moves and motivations could be drawn more sharply than any living architect's ever could be. collectivism - not in politics but in man's soul. His battles against mediocrity epitomized her central theme of individualism vs. Rand's belief that man's ego is the fountainhead of human progress. For many who seek out the book for its philosophical underpinnings, Roark has come to personify Ms.

The fountain head ayn rand