The Fountainhead

We've got a new problem that I don't think anyone really, I mean, it seemed like Ayn Rand.

Now I was, I've been saying for years, I don't know what your thoughts on Ayn are, but for years that her works like Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead were some of the most prescient dystopian novels ever written.

But there's none of this new sort of...

We're turning the chapter on where her stuff won't be obsolete, but where it's less prescient because now we're getting into this new technological era with the AI and things like that.

real have any idea what she went through and shit like she

wrote So Anthem, a little science fiction novel that I think if she would have just written Anthem and not gone on to do Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, if she would have just stuck with Anthem, it would have been fine.

Because Anthem is, it's not a great book, but it's also not terrible and it's not super problematic.

But even then, she went on to develop objectivism and she went on to who is John Galt and this and that.

Still, the two books kept her going through those lean times, kept her going long enough to finish her architecture novel and find a publisher.

In 1943, The Fountainhead was finally released.

For Ayn Rand, and for millions of Americans, it would change everything.

If you only know Rand for her politics, you might imagine The Fountainhead is an objectivist's creed about an unbridled Superman repeatedly punching the government in the testicles.

But the novel is really a story,

one that centers not on rigid philosophy, but on universal themes.

is a human but the fountainhead goes beyond just rock to tap deep into american ideals there's the glory of human achievement the creativity rock brings to people's lives there's the excitement of seeing rock succeed not because he's rich but because he's talented unlike his rival peter keating only in the game to impress others Basically, it's a celebration of hard work, artistry, and being yourself, all wrapped up in a readable, if overlong, drama.

It's no wonder it became a hit.

and when you think about the novels you know people shouldn't be who have not read them and who are listening to podcasts Don't be frightened away that these are big, deep philosophical tomes.

Both The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged are great novels.

They're great stories.

Read them for the stories.

Yeah.

And, uh, I, I, The note I wrote down for this, we were just thinking of the Art Deco and stuff, and the very Ayn Rand, Fountainhead kind of designs, was I wrote down, it's like Bioshock, the game.

It's like the 1920s vision of the future.

is what I thought this was going to be.