Has anyone read 'The Fountainhead'?

Harry Angstrom

I'm surprised that anybody bothers reading Ayn Rand. Awful woman.

Permabear

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ush

Don't look around the eyes, look into the eyes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ooKsv_SX4Y

drumswan

<snip>

Harry Angstrom

Permabear wrote: »

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In fairness, it's impossible to discuss Ayn Rand's novels in isolation, without examining Rand herself, and coming to the logical conclusion that she was a nasty, spiteful, horrible individual.

PS I'll PM you my address for the dartboard

Harry Angstrom

Harry Angstrom wrote: »

In fairness, it's impossible to discuss Ayn Rand's novels in isolation

For people who haven't read them or think that's the only way to discredit a novel, sure
For other people who read the novels themselves we manage to discuss literature without going "lol author's ugly" - which people manage to do for most everyone else. Nobody has to like them or agree with them but their points would be a lot more credible and less nonsensical if they stuck to the lit

Orson Scott Card has some pretty controversial views but nobody insists Ender's Game is bad as a novel just because of them

Permabear

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ush

Permabear wrote: »

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Her writings spring from, and give expression to, her tragic lack of understanding of the world she lived in. If a writer cannot understand their fellow man, then they can't write literature that reflects humanity. Thats why her possible autism and definite drug-addiction are relevant. They can help explain why she was wrong about the workings of the world and why her books are so bad.

So....Do you think she was delusional and incapable of empathy? If you can't understand human emotion, and think everything has to be empirical and logical, than you miss the bigger picture.

Permabear

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ush

Permabear wrote: »

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Or maybe she doesn't grasp the concept of empathy or understand humanity's mutual dependence.

Permabear

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Valmont

ush wrote: »

Her writings spring from, and give expression to, her tragic lack of understanding of the world she lived in. If a writer cannot understand their fellow man, then they can't write literature that reflects humanity. Thats why her possible autism and definite drug-addiction are relevant. They can help explain why she was wrong about the workings of the world and why her books are so bad.

So....Do you think she was delusional and incapable of empathy? If you can't understand human emotion, and think everything has to be empirical and logical, than you miss the bigger picture.

Ush, I'm still wondering how you have come to these profound conclusions considering you gave away on the first page of this thread that you hadn't even read ten pages of The Fountainhead by referencing events and themes that the book did not in any way contain.

ush

Permabear wrote: »

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Nope.

ush

Valmont wrote: »

Ush, I'm still wondering how you have come to these profound conclusions considering you gave away on the first page of this thread that you hadn't even read ten pages of The Fountainhead by referencing events and themes that the book did not in any way contain.

Haven't read much Dan Brown either and I know he's ****e too.

Permabear

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Valmont

William Faulkner once said to his daughter: "Nobody remembered Shakespeare's children". So you should probably avoid his crap too, ush.

ush

Permabear wrote: »

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I would never claim to knowing "all" about anything.

Permabear wrote: »

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Do you need a "method" with a novel thats so obviously bad from page one. Even if you flicked through it you'd see obvious didactics, badly executed. I don't agree with her philosophy, so I'm hardly going to be sympathetic to her message or themes. She was so fundamentally wrong about the nature of humanity, that she could never accurately portray individual humans and greater society.

Even if you take the plot of The Fountainhead, blowing-up a building because you didn't get your own way, really? Its like a petulant 5 year old thats gone to architect school. Atlas Shrugged has the same "its my ball and I'm going home" crap. Those industrialists who retreat from society wouldn't last two minutes on their own without the aid of society.

ush

Permabear wrote: »

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Valmont wrote: »

William Faulkner once said to his daughter: "Nobody remembered Shakespeare's children". So you should probably avoid his crap too, ush.

These are straw man arguments. Damaged people, or even nasty examples, can write beautifully and wisely about the human condition. I've never stated otherwise.

Individual character flaws are something that we all have. If you were to go through the biographies of any writer you'll find flaws and personal failings. But writers, despite their all too obvious humanity, can show us aspects of life that we may have not experienced or processed first hand.

Rand doesn't do this. There's no shades of grey, just an objective truth. Instead her impairments, and I feel guilty about reducing a person to a diagnosis, are all you get. How can you examine life if you've all the answers already. You'll only end up preaching.

But thats just my subjective opinion.

Harry Angstrom

bluewolf wrote: »

For people who haven't read them or think that's the only way to discredit a novel, sure
For other people who read the novels themselves we manage to discuss literature without going "lol author's ugly" - which people manage to do for most everyone else. Nobody has to like them or agree with them but their points would be a lot more credible and less nonsensical if they stuck to the lit

Orson Scott Card has some pretty controversial views but nobody insists Ender's Game is bad as a novel just because of them

As I said, her novels cannot be read in isolation to her personality. Her books are quasi-philosophical. She's basically endeavouring to peddle her flawed and selfish thinking through the characters in her novels. It's a bit like reading Candide and trying to separate Voltaire from the ideas contained therein.

ush

Well said Rabbit.

Harry Angstrom

ush wrote: »

Well said Rabbit.

Cheers ush

diveout

ush wrote: »

I would never claim to knowing "all" about anything.



Do you need a "method" with a novel thats so obviously bad from page one. Even if you flicked through it you'd see obvious didactics, badly executed. I don't agree with her philosophy, so I'm hardly going to be sympathetic to her message or themes. She was so fundamentally wrong about the nature of humanity, that she could never accurately portray individual humans and greater society.

Even if you take the plot of The Fountainhead, blowing-up a building because you didn't get your own way, really? Its like a petulant 5 year old thats gone to architect school. Atlas Shrugged has the same "its my ball and I'm going home" crap. Those industrialists who retreat from society wouldn't last two minutes on their own without the aid of society.

There is a character in Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent who tries to blow up the prime meridian. Are you going to try to find his aspergers or some other fickly biographical information to discredit all his novels.

And speaking of aspies, look at this: Is Ireland an asperger nation?
http://www.libertiespress.com/Unstoppable_Brilliance_Walker_and_Fitzgerald_p/978-1-905483-28-0.htm

Without empathy where would we all be? On the other hand think carefully. You look at a devasting death of a child and you want the person who did this to pay. You feel the empathy for the loss of the life, for his parents, for the generations who will never be because this child has died. And then two years later you look at the face of the person who did it, behind a cage on Death row eating his last meal, knowing he will die at 6 am the next day. You see the pain of his parents who know their son is about to be executed, and perhaps the terror of his own child too, who will now live without a father because the state is going to take his life.

It is not straightforward lovey dovey hugs and kisses.

Read this worthwhile examination on empathy:
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2013/05/20/130520crat_atlarge_bloom?currentPage=all

ush

diveout wrote: »

There is a character in Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent who tries to blow up the prime meridian. Are you going to try to find his aspergers or some other fickly biographical information to discredit all his novels.

Another a straw man argument. We've been over this.

Harry Angstrom

Who would've thunk that, in this day and age, there would still be apologists hanging around, trying to defend the selfish individualistic capitalist principles that Rand espoused? Given what's happened in the past 5 or 6 years, I would've hoped that the nonsensical bullsh!t peddled by her would've been consigned to the dustbin of fascist history, yet there are still people on this thread who would wish to separate Rand from her repulsive views.
As Joe Duffy would say, "Well done, well done" :rolleyes:

Permabear

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ush

Celtic Tiger era is more fitting. Hybris and the selfish coked up worship of money.

Permabear

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ush

Permabear wrote: »

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An elite thinking they're better than everyone else and deciding that they don't need the rest of society. Thats exactly the plot of Atlas Shrugged.

Valmont

ush wrote: »

An elite thinking they're better than everyone else and deciding that they don't need the rest of society. Thats exactly the plot of Atlas Shrugged.

No, it's about a group of industrialists and inventors who are pushed out of society and who fight against those trying to destroy them. These characters live to create, contribute, produce, and yes, earn lots of money. Their overriding concern however, is to bring the best possible product to the market and to please as many customers as possible; Rand's original insight was that they did this, not out of loyalty to the good of others, but because it was their interests. Once again, you have made up the plot of a book you haven't read in order to criticise it. Tell me, at what point of this debate did you start to feel silly for reviewing books you haven't read?

Or could you please share the secret of your superpowers with me; I'm reading the Brothers Karamazov at the moment and it would be great if I could just put it down after ten pages and simultaneously know everything about the philosophy, the plot, the characters, and a sense of the poetry would be nice too.

One of the main guys as an engineer working as a low paid labourer, yeah, totally elite

Why don't you try actually reading it instead of spouting nonsense about those awful "elites". If you still disagree with it then - which you may well do - and want to tell us why, we'll be all ears

ush

bluewolf wrote: »

One of the main guys as an engineer working as a low paid labourer, yeah, totally elite

They thought of themselves, or rather Rand thought, that they were too good to live with regulation. I reckon she thought of them as an elite, such was her despise anyone who didn't fit her narrow definitions.

bluewolf wrote: »

Why don't you try actually reading it

I tried but its so bad.

ush

Valmont wrote: »

No, it's about a group of industrialists and inventors who are pushed out of society and who fight against those trying to destroy them.

Thats your interpretation.

Rand had difficulty understanding our common humanity. Anything she wrote reflected that.

fruvai

Thomas Pynchon based a character on Rand in his debut novel V. She's a sex maniac called Mafia :pac:

His wife was an authoress. Her novels-three to date- ran a thousand pages each and like sanitary napkins had gathered in an immense and faithful sisterhood of consumers. There’d even evolved somehow a kind of sodality or fan club that sat around, read from her books and discussed her Theory.
If the two of them ever did get around to making a final split, it would be that Theory there that would do it. Unfortunately Mafia believed in it as fervently as any of her followers. It wasn’t much of a Theory, more wishful thinking on Mafia’s part than anything else. There being but the single proposition: the world can only be rescued from certain decay through Heroic Love.
In practice Heroic Love meant screwing five or six times a night, every night, with a great many athletic, half-sadistic wrestling holds thrown in. The one time Winsome had blown up he’d yelled, “You are turning our marriage into a trampoline act,” which Mafia thought was a pretty good line. It appeared in her next novel, spoken by Schwartz, a weak, jewish psychopath who was the major villain.
All her characters fell into the disturbingly predictable racial alignment. The sympathetic-those godlike, inexhaustible sex athletes she used for heroes and heroines (and heroin? he wondered) were all tall, strong, white though often robustly tanned (all over), Anglo-Saxon, Teutonic and/or Scandinavian

Toby Take a Bow

I think one can have an opinion on Ayn Rand from reading bits of her work, pieces about her, that sort of stuff, but surely you can't have an informed opinion about The Fountainhead if you haven't actually read it?

Permabear

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ush

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

I think one can have an opinion on Ayn Rand from reading bits of her work, pieces about her, that sort of stuff, but surely you can't have an informed opinion about The Fountainhead if you haven't actually read it?

If you've never met Ayn Rand, how can you have an informed opinon about her?

Works pretty much the same way with her books. You can see that the writing is bad from merely reading the first page. You're aware of her underlying philosophy and how whacked it is. You're aware of the fact that the books are pushed by right-wing think-tanks, otherwise they'd have been long forgotten.

I don't really get this text is sacred thing. I think you can have valid opinions on books through knowing about literature, the canon, the writer's aims, were it fits into publishing history, technical aspects of the writing etc.

Toby Take a Bow

ush wrote: »

If you've never met Ayn Rand, how can you have an informed opinon about her?

Works pretty much the same way with her books. You can see that the writing is bad from merely reading the first page. You're aware of her underlying philosophy and how whacked it is. You're aware of the fact that the books are pushed by right-wing think-tanks, otherwise they'd have been long forgotten.

I don't really get this text is sacred thing. I think you can have valid opinions on books through knowing about literature, the canon, the writer's aims, were it fits into publishing history, technical aspects of the writing etc.

Yeah, I see your point, but how do I know whether Rand's philosophy changes (however slightly) in The Fountainhead from her overall philosophy? I assume she's not saying exactly the same thing as in her other books. I assume there is some sort of development (whether positive or negative).

I think we probably share the same views on Rand (although I would less inclined to be as vocal as you are, as I have only read secondary pieces on her) but when discussing a specific work, at least reading a fairly substantial critique of it might be in order.

Of course, if it's a general thread about Rand, then your arguments would, in my opinion, hold more weight. I think you're arguing from the general, whilst others are arguing from the particular, which is probably more relevant given that the thread is specifically about The Fountainhead.

Valmont

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

Of course, if it's a general thread about Rand, then your arguments would, in my opinion, hold more weight. I think you're arguing from the general, whilst others are arguing from the particular, which is probably more relevant given that the thread is specifically about The Fountainhead.

Although when you say your opinion, you really mean the opinion of the authors of the secondary sources you have read. In which case, you're even less qualified to discuss Rand in generalities than ush is The Fountainhead, which he hasn't even read. I have no intention of ever reading a Harry Potter book for various reasons but I won't wade into a thread on The Prisoner of Azkaban discussing Rowling's writing 'in general' or even the finer points of her work.

Harry Angstrom

Again, the point seems to be lost here. Ayn Rand was pushing her philosophy of greed and selfishness through the characters in her books. Comparing her with Rowling or most other novelists is crass. I believe I can have an opinion on Karl Marx without reading Das Kapital, or Hitler without reading Mein Kampf.

Sulla Felix

Harry Angstrom wrote: »

Again, the point seems to be lost here. Ayn Rand was pushing her philosophy of greed and selfishness through the characters in her books. Comparing her with Rowling or most other novelists is crass. I believe I can have an opinion on Karl Marx without reading Das Kapital, or Hitler without reading Mein Kampf.

No one is saying you can't have an opinion on the author without reading their works. It is however, a little rediculous to have an opinion on a work of literature, in a literature forum, without reading that work of literature.

RichardoKhan

Over rated excuse maker for selfish greedy rich people. Find something better to read.........................

Harry Angstrom

Sulla Felix wrote: »

No one is saying you can't have an opinion on the author without reading their works. It is however, a little rediculous to have an opinion on a work of literature, in a literature forum, without reading that work of literature.

The Fountainhead is more than just a work of literature. It is representative of an extreme socio-political ideology.

ush

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

Yeah, I see your point, but how do I know whether Rand's philosophy changes (however slightly) in The Fountainhead from her overall philosophy?

I'm sure there **** or ****e differences here or there in her philosophy. She did change her views to suit herself. But is that really gonna save such a bad piece of writing.

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

I think you're arguing from the general, whilst others are arguing from the particular, which is probably more relevant given that the thread is specifically about The Fountainhead.

Difference is I don't condone the behavior she encourages. She, and by extension her books, are sympathetic to greed. I'm very specific in my criticism of literature.

ush

Valmont wrote: »

even the finer points of her work.

There are no finer points with Rand. Its black and white. No subtlety.

ush

Sulla Felix wrote: »

No one is saying you can't have an opinion on the author without reading their works. It is however, a little rediculous to have an opinion on a work of literature, in a literature forum, without reading that work of literature.

No. Her aim and method are well known. The storyline is well known. Her writing is notoriously bad. Her ideas are full of holes, her characters wooden. Can't really see how reading all of the book would somehow validate those opinions.

ush

RichardoKhan wrote: »

Over rated excuse maker for selfish greedy rich people.

Sociopathic.

Valmont

Harry Angstrom wrote: »

Again, the point seems to be lost here. Ayn Rand was pushing her philosophy of greed and selfishness through the characters in her books.

Again, the main point is that had you read any of her books, you would know Rand's philosophy is not about 'greed and selfishness'. The only greedy characters in The Fountainhead are the bad guys.

Harry Angstrom wrote: »

I believe I can have an opinion on Karl Marx without reading Das Kapital, or Hitler without reading Mein Kampf.

Yes, this is what we call an 'uninformed opinion'. Mein Kampf is a crucial read if you want to understand totalitarian psychology - but who needs to actually read anything when opinions can be formed and then vomited all in a few seconds.

The frightening thing here is that you all could have actually read The Fountainhead by now and we could be having a substantive and informed discussion rather than batting off people who prefer to voice their opinions without reading the necessary material.

Valmont

ush wrote:

No. Her aim and method are well known.

Not to you, as you've clearly demonstrated during this debate.

ush wrote:

The storyline is well known.

Not to you though, you thought The Fountainhead was an economics treaty!

ush wrote:

Her ideas are full of holes

Of course, you are yet to actually reference even one of her ideas.

ush wrote:

Can't really see how reading all of the book would somehow validate those opinions.

An opinion with no argument behind it, or no source to support it, is the logical equivalent of a burp. Are you going to carry on burping at us, ush?

Valmont

Harry Angstrom wrote: »

The Fountainhead is more than just a work of literature. It is representative of an extreme socio-political ideology.

Once again, you are so far off the mark it is embarrassing. The Fountainhead is about art and truth. Politics do not come into the book, at any point. You may as well say Das Kapital is a book of poems to Satan because Karl Marx actually wrote poems to Satan at one point but that would illogical, wouldn't it?

Permabear

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