Remembering my first reading of the fountainhead

[Alfonso Jones]

First readings:

I’m thinking back to my first reading of The Fountainhead. I’m remembering what a revolutionary experience it was for me. The opening pages were full of hooks for a young boy (I was barely a teenager, 13, when I read The Fountainhead for the firs time.).

But Rand got me with Roark’s meeting with the Dean. “Yes, God damn it, the Parthenon!!!” And the speech which followed – this was a sort of person who I had not ever met in literature. This was not just some rebel without a cause. This was someone with true integrity – his choices rooted not in rebellion, but his rebellion rooted in his choices.

This is a great memory. I found a voice – an author who painted a picture of a concept of integrity which was not just adhering to some code of ethics which came from an antiquated book telling us to value others and not ourselves. (And if that is the goal – why is it not equally corrupt to value them – they are selves also, are they not? Or is the ethics they teach, as I learned by reading Rand further (and hearing her speak!), instead not an ethics to live by, but one to die by?)

This author – Rand - was fundamentally different. I was a voracious reader – checking out 4 – 6 books at the library, and bringing them back in less than a week, because I had finished all of them and wanted more. But this author stood out. What else had she written? A quick trip to the library - - - an even longer one!!! Atlas Shrugged. Check it out – before someone else gets it!!!

“I said we won’t discuss Henry Cameron…”

And then…

“Because I don't intend to build in order to serve or help anyone. I don't intend to build in order to have clients. I intend to have clients in order to build.”

Great stuff. Exactly the right thing for a young teenager dealing with the notion of “independence.” Building young minds.

Roark’s answer to Keating’s question: "If you want my advice, Peter," he said at last, "you've made a mistake already. By asking me. By asking anyone. Never ask people. Not about your work. Don't you know what you want? How can you stand it, not to know?"

A great memory. For how many more did Rand provide this sort of catalyst for development of their young minds?

Bill P (Alfonso)

[Brant Gaede]

Well put, Bill!

However, I was surprised to learn your mind's been developed. I hope you retained the mineral rights.

Seriously, how wonderful to have experienced reading those great novels for the first time. I hope they are still being enjoyed that way today. For me it was like someone with poor eyesight getting his first pair of glasses and finally really seeing things as they are. Later on, of course, you learn there's more to look at, but the clarity is retained.

--Brant

Edited October 21, 2008 by Brant Gaede

[Chris Grieb]

Brant; Great comment!

My first Rand novel was Atlas. I had a feeling that I was supposed hate these heroes and ideas but found I could not.

Edited October 21, 2008 by Chris Grieb

[Judith]

"Atlas" was my first Rand read. Someone recommended it to me when I was a senior in college, and I picked it up right before I left for grad school. I couldn't get into it; the first twenty pages with Eddie Willers and the tree were deadly dull. Then after my first year of grad school some friends of mine turned out to be avid Rand admirers and told me I'd really, really like her, so I decided to make a concerted effort once again. Once I got to Dagny in the train I was hooked. She was everything I had ever wanted to be as a woman, and the mystery also hooked me. I was supposed to be studying for my Ph.D. prelim exam, but I was reading the book more than I was studying. (Yes, I did also pass the exam, but I didn't do as well as I should have!)

Judith

Edited October 21, 2008 by Judith

[Barbara Branden]

I was just fifteen. A friend of my mother's from New York had sent her a book entitled The Fountainhead.. Since I read everything in sight -- often with a flashlight under the covers at night when I was supposed to be sleeping -- and since I'd finished the four books that were all the library allowed readers to borrow weekly, I spirited the book away to my favorite reading spot in an oak tree in my yard.

As I followed Roark's trajectory, I felt as if I had to remind myself to breathe. "He can't give up!" I kept thinking. "He can't!" It was almost a prayer. a prayer directed to the writer. "Don't let him give up!" And then, when Roark joined Cameron, I knew, with an overwhelming feeling of relief, "He won't give up!" This was a writer I could trust.

I didn't read the book, I lived it. As the scenes unfolded before me, I was a part of each one. I was Roark when he turned down his great commiission because the board of directors demanded that he alter his design, and I knew, with him, that it was the most selfish thing I'd ever done. When Dominique told Roark that she intended to destroy him before the world could do so, I put the book town for the only time, to weep for Roark, for Dominique, for myself. When Wynand capitulated and closed the Banner, I felt his agony. But when Roark gave his final courtroom speech, I was not the speaker, I was the audience, hearing the words that would free me as well as Roark, hearing his vindication of both of us. He was telling me what no one had said before, that I would never need to compromise, that I was right, that I need never lose my ideals and goals and passions, and that anything was possible to me. I had felt it before; now, I knew it. Roark had given me the words.

And long before, more than five years later, I read the most liberating words of all, I sensed that I "never had to take any of it seriously."

Barbara

[kiaer.ts]

Since I read everything in sight -- often with a flashlight under the covers at night when I was supposed to be sleeping -- and since I'd finished the four books that were all the library allowed readers to borrow weekly, I spirited the book away to my favorite reading spot in an oak tree in my yard.

LOL! I too was a flashilight reader, and also ran up against the five book limit at the town library. Luckily Mom would usually only borrow one a week and I could use her card to get an extra four for myself.

[Roger Bissell]

Since I read everything in sight -- often with a flashlight under the covers at night when I was supposed to be sleeping -- and since I'd finished the four books that were all the library allowed readers to borrow weekly, I spirited the book away to my favorite reading spot in an oak tree in my yard.

LOL! I too was a flashilight reader, and also ran up against the five book limit at the town library. Luckily Mom would usually only borrow one a week and I could use her card to get an extra four for myself.

The town library -- yes, those were the good old days. I remember my first visit there, circa 1958 in Cumberland, Iowa (population 425). I asked the librarian if there was a limit on how many books I could check out, and she said there wasn't. So, I selected 10 Hardy Boys mysteries and plunked them down on her desk to check out. She promptly told me "that's too many books." I said, "I thought you told me there wasn't any limit on checking out books," and she replied, "There isn't, but that's too many." Arrrrgh!

REB

[kiaer.ts]

As for The Fountainhead itself, I bought it before I bought Atlas, but after all Rand's non-fiction. But I could not get into it after to attempts where I stopped each time about page 50. I had purposefully left Atlas for last, since it was longer and I like longer books - i.e., saving the best for last. But I eventually picked up Atlas in frustration with The Fountainhead. I was hooked on Atlas from the first conversation with James, first chapter. It was obviously brilliant, skewering something I had long been aware of but had never heard anyone identify. In the summer after 10th grade (I found Rand that May) I attended Cornell Universities Summer Program and took philosophy 101 & 102 and Linguistics 201 & 202. I finished Atlas there and then finally read Fountainhead in the oriental rock garden. I saw a lot of people reading The Fountainhead. They were in the Architecture Program. I also had my first run in with an "ex-Randian" who saw me reading Atlas and said "You'll grow out of it." I said I doubt it, and that was 24 years ago. (He didn't know that except for the explicit atheism I had always been an Objectivist anyway, so I think I had an unfair advantage in the implied bet.)

[Brant Gaede]

Since I read everything in sight -- often with a flashlight under the covers at night when I was supposed to be sleeping -- and since I'd finished the four books that were all the library allowed readers to borrow weekly, I spirited the book away to my favorite reading spot in an oak tree in my yard.

LOL! I too was a flashilight reader, and also ran up against the five book limit at the town library. Luckily Mom would usually only borrow one a week and I could use her card to get an extra four for myself.

The town library -- yes, those were the good old days. I remember my first visit there, circa 1958 in Cumberland, Iowa (population 425). I asked the librarian if there was a limit on how many books I could check out, and she said there wasn't. So, I selected 10 Hardy Boys mysteries and plunked them down on her desk to check out. She promptly told me "that's too many books." I said, "I thought you told me there wasn't any limit on checking out books," and she replied, "There isn't, but that's too many." Arrrrgh!

REB

Those may have been the old Hardy Boy books before they PCed them. I don't think you'd find the boys packing guns in the rewritten books. I also liked the 1920s ambiance of the old books.

--Brant

[emb021]

I was first exposed to The Fountainhead in high school, but didn't read it. My cousin and I were interested in architecture at the time, and he gave me a copy to read (for the architecture stuff, not the philosophy). But it just sat on my self (was more interested in reading sf...)

FWIW, I later went into computers when I went to college.

I didn't really start reading Rand until I got to college and go into libertarianism/objectivism. I started to buy all her books at the time and read them. I really don't know if I read her fiction or non-fiction first. Pretty sure I read Foundtainhead before I takled Atlas.

[Brant Gaede]

I was first exposed to The Fountainhead in high school, but didn't read it. My cousin and I were interested in architecture at the time, and he gave me a copy to read (for the architecture stuff, not the philosophy). But it just sat on my self (was more interested in reading sf...)

FWIW, I later went into computers when I went to college.

I didn't really start reading Rand until I got to college and go into libertarianism/objectivism. I started to buy all her books at the time and read them. I really don't know if I read her fiction or non-fiction first. Pretty sure I read Foundtainhead before I takled Atlas.

Michael, if there ever was a word that should be a word your typo "takled" is it!

--Brant

[kiaer.ts]

(listen thru!)