The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand

I’m glad that I read Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead only now that I’m older, when I can appreciate it fully.  And I must say that it is one of the best works of literature I have ever experienced.  For the time being I will not express much of my reaction to it, for I only finished the book last night and I am still in its thrall.  I still feel entirely too close to it, and I’m afraid that anything I manage to say now won’t make much sense.  I am completely startled, awed and overwhelmed by its truth and power.  I will never see the world and mankind the same way again.  It also left me with so many questions, some of which I beg to posit in the meantime.

1. This book has been around for decades and has been read by so many people.  Have they been struck by it as much as I have?  And if they had experienced the same awe that I did, had it changed the way they see the world and the people that populate it in the same way that it changed mine?

2.  If so many people have read, believe or had been convinced by the ideas presented in this book, then how come our lives are still bound by debilitating collectivism?  How come we cannot live by the truths presented here in this book?  Why can we not win against all the coercive harmony around us?

3.  If the story happened in this reality of ours instead of in pages and in dream, could those characters like Roark, Dominique, and Wynand have existed?  I wish I could say that yes, they could, that it’s possible.  But I’m a great pessimist and it makes me sad to know that they couldn’t possibly be.  Still the question persists in my mind – perhaps I still do hope, after all?

4.  I don’t know if it’s only me, but the concept of individualism presented here makes me think of humanism as well.  Aren’t they both in favor of the potential of man?  Achievement, self-respect, self-fulfilment, affirmation of the ego, the self as the prime mover and the motivation – aren’t all these the ideas that exalt the human in us?  What can we do to find our own fulfilment, our own happiness, and reach our full potential as human beings?

So many questions crowd my mind and I wish there was someone who could answer them all for me; or better yet, that I could find all the answers for myself.  There are many resources one could consult.  Ayn Rand is much respected as a philosopher and her Objectivism is worth looking into. Many authors and critics have written countless treatises and essays about her and her work. www.aynrand.org.  The Ayn Rand Institute, etc.  But I wish to think more about it for my own sake, and for that I will need time.  I might write about it more when I don’t feel so consumed by it as I do now.  But allow me to say that I truly fell in love with the book, and I wish more and more people will read, understand, and imbibe it.  If we can live by it, well then I sincerely believe we could make this world a much better place for each and every one of us.  For me, it is simply beyond awesome.