I haven't had a chance to take my old computer to the store yet, and I'm dreading that everything on it will be gone. To my relief, I found my Halloween fic on my flash drive (so I had a moment of common sense somewhere in the past), so I'll start posting chapters of that in October. But the Christmas and New Year's fics were on the old computer. :(
Oh, it's so good that the fic you're needing now the most has been preserved ! I also found what I needed in my backup notebook and probably should be able to pull off what I had planned for October, so at least that's good. If the standard repair shop won't be able to retrieve data from your old computer, there are more advanced services specializing in it - data labs they call themselves, I think? - which are miracle workers in this regard, but it's gonna cost more, unfortunately. In my poorish country it starts from around 200 dollars, and I know that when my brother-in-law had his hard disc destroyed he opted to send it to his home country instead of having data retrieval in Germany. But we gotta do the thing when we gotta do the thing, as long as we have options... I hope that the standard procedure will suffice though!
And Wynand discovered the hard way that there were a lot more of the Great Brainwashed Them than there were of the Enlightened Him.
It reminds me of Rupert Murdoch and various Fox TV hosts suddenly horrified by their audience supporting the views that seem wrong to them (i.e. about COVID or Trump) but are only a natural consequence of all the information they've been feeding to them for decades. Wynand was looking at the monster he'd helped to create and had no problem with that until the monster appeared on his doorstep and demanded to be heard. The Fountainhead can be prophetic in some ways, but not how Rand would like it to be ;)
I'd say the second weakest aspect of Rand's writing are the courtroom scenes.
It was so jarring because up to this point, the story was reasonably realistic (save for Gale's instant infatuation with Roark, of course). All the stories about how and why clients would accept or reject Roark's designs presented a broad spectrum of human views and influences, and it was clear that Rand had some idea about architecture and human views on architecture. Maybe she blatantly decided to ignore how legal proceedings work in real world... Or maybe she thought that her vision was possible - back in the 1930s and 1940s there weren't many resources to do your research (and the realism in contemporary literature probably reflected that) and she hadn't had personal experiences with criminal justice which, good for her.
That said, she'd kind of written herself into a corner there. Roark had to blow up the building so everything could build up to the climax of the implosion of the Banner, and he couldn't really hide what he did, but at the same time, Roark couldn't be found guilty or there wouldn't be an uplifting ending.
I've just thought that Roark might have as well treated the guard to some chloroform and then simply vandalized the buildings together with Dominique, writing on the walls what exactly was wrong with this final version of his design. Wynand would defend him all the same, Toohey would manage to orchestrate his downfall anyway, and maybe the public would sympathize with Roark more (I surely would) - but, of course, it wouldn't be as impactful, and he'd probably already had his speech ready so, why bother. Terrorism for the win!
That's a great way to look at it! Honestly, if you forget about Roark's, um, devotion to Wynand, this makes a lot of sense. It's like the universe's revenge on Wynand for ruining so many people's lives.
It must be truly devastating for him - the only two people he'd ever loved betraying him like that! And the movie killed him off? Now I'm relieved that it wasn't poor Petey ;)
The story does acknowledge Henry Cameron's contribution to Roark's professional development, but I don't think Rand felt society (as in, any sort of collective) could support the growth of any such genius. Unless this was a society where everyone was a perfect Objectivist, like in Atlas Shrugged. For her, great people tend to leap into existence like Athena from the head of Zeus, and society either holds them back or worships them. It's pretty black-and-white. At least The Fountainhead had some people who don't do either.
I think that the story pretty much claims that Henry Cameron had sprung out of nothingness to change architecture forever, while in reality he should had his own teachers and sources of inspiration as well, just like Frank Lloyd Wright had, but Rand didn't acknowledge it, obviously. Read today, many concepts in this exactly(!) 80-year-old novel has aged poorly but, of course, back in 1920s, 30s, and 40s the myth of self-made men was still prevalent while psychology (especially developmental), sociology and, well, economy weren't that developed yet, and in the 1940s people probably really were afraid that the world was going to end in one totalitarian hell or another. I suppose that Rand developed her philosophy largely drawing from her own experiences - and it's usually easier to remember all the obstacles society treats us with than all the support it gives us. She surely didn't think about her, so to speak, unfair advantages like her comfortable initial upbringing and the people who helped her get to the States. Also, in the 1920s Soviet Russia in order to give something to certain people it had to be literally taken from other people, while in America she wasn't eligible for any government help unlike some so, right or wrong, it's understandable why she was against taxes and welfare state, and all for capitalism. Her problematic views on leaving the poor without support because their situation is clearly their own fault, and I dread to spell out what she seemed to think about "subnormal" children... What is sad though is constant rigidity of her views suggests that she didn't feel compelled to test her theories against new evidence.
Now I'm imagining a follow-up where Scrapper is trying his best to make sense of this world where architects seem to own the buildings they design, such that the design of these cannot be changed.
Oh-my-god, it's perfect! I'm thinking of watching the movie and now I want to watch it when thinking "What would Bonecrusher comment about it?" Like a Mystery Science Theater, but more along the lines of "A professional architect and a professional demolitionist react to The Fountainhead"!
What I find inspiring is the importance of being true to yourself and doing what you find personally fulfilling. I'm originally from a culture which places huge emphasis on obedience to parents and where the needs of the community take precedence over the needs of the individual. Because of this, my parents did their best to stop me studying science and being an atheist. I never had any encouragement when it came to my writing either (the literal response was "When your book's in the front window of Barnes and Noble, I'll read it").
Oh... I'm sorry, it had to be really hard... Of course, there's no wrong source for inspiration as long as the inspiration is positive, and at various stages of our lives we respond to different messages! My family didn't discourage me, with no knowledge of how the literature market and, well, capitalism work, and now are probably baffled how I'm not a famous writer and I grew up to be perfectly average. My mom's questions whether I considered self-publishing, and when I'm gonna publish my childhood scribbles she knows of, or "So-and-so has such interesting (meaning: perfectly common) WW2 memories, you should make a book out of it!" When you're an outlier in your family - as opposed to following generational traditions - they somehow always react in worst ways possible, good intentions or not… Heck, I keep writing about Starscream working for a university and hating his life because I know they wanted this for me, but I luckily didn't listen to them!
That's a very individual view, of course, and I don't expect anyone else to like The Fountainhead. I usually agree with critiques of it, just as I do yours. I also have no doubt there are other books which have the same message of being yourself without the problems of The Fountainhead, but this book came along at a time in my life when I desperately needed support, and it holds meaning for me because of this.
I feel you, I can't ditch Lovecraft for similar reasons even though he would literally hate my guts ;) The three parts of The Fountainhead were very interesting to read as observant and possibly satirical, but the last part with Wynand's martyrdom and Roark's actions rubbed me the wrong way. Currently, we have a problem with one libertarian party (they're actually fascists in disguise) and while the Libertarian Movement would probably come into being anyway without Rand, I can't help but think that she has started something that can affect my life in very real and very negative ways, hence I can't be, well, completely objective about her views.
Anyway, it's been a really interesting discussion, and I've enjoyed hearing your thoughts on this so much. If you ever decide to tackle Atlas Shrugged, I'm there for that too!
Thank you, I enjoyed it as well! I'm not sure about Atlas Shrugged, its size is a bit intimidating, but who knows what's in the cards for me :) Have a nice Sunday!
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Satoru on Chapter 5 Sun 17 Sep 2023 01:12PM UTC
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