The Fountainhead

So finally I have read [The Fountainhead] a novel that I knew many people praising... Once I started reading it I couldn't stop till I finished it...
The novel is written by Ayn Rand... in the novel Rand chose Architecture as a form of self-expression...

I can't understand why during my 5 years studying architecture none of my professors recommended the book... It is such a good book and deals with architecture in a new critical way... allowing us to interpret the history of architecture and the modern practices of it in a new way...

Many of the main characters are involved in Architecture whether they are architects like the main character Howard Roark or they are critics of architecture like Ellsworth Toohey...
The novel talks about selfishness, egotism and altruism through another perspective which shakes some of the bases of how societies are led to approve or condemn actions that are defined as virtues or sins by other people for whatever agenda...
As you are reading there will be many sections which you forget you are reading a novel but you concentrate on the ideas presented... again gaining more insights about architecture and society.
I liked the way Rand has used architecture as a medium to convey her own philosophies...
The novel is definitely a must-read... especially for architects and architecture students...
The novel had been made into a movie in the 1940s but I'm always disappointed when a novel is turned into a movie... so I recommend the novel... having said that I found this video of Howard Roark's speech toward the end of the movie... is worth seeing...

The novel also tackles some of the ideas related to Capitalism and though I'm myself an anti-capitalism to the core... I have to say that I had a new understanding of Capitalism that made me reflect more about some of own ideas related to man, freedom and wealth...
Also the concept of self, self-sacrifice, selfishness made me think about the concept of the self in my own Islamic beliefs which I'll talk about some other time...

It is a mind opening when we understand the hidden driving forces that shape, create and re-create some of our basic cultural and societal patterns...

The Fountainhead one of my best novels of all times...