The Fountainhead P. 534-572

The dinner with the three of them all together and talking seemed almost to have two currents flowing in it. There was the surface current in which Gail and Roark seemed to bond and behave almost like brothers in the same cause, and then another undercurrent that would not be put into words between Roark and Dominique. There is no eruption and Gail continues to go unaware of the fact that Roark and Dominique are in love. One theme is brought up as they sit and talk over dinner, that seems to be quite relevant to everyone at the table. It was Gail who brought up the consistency of one’s feelings, “A feeling which changes never existed in the first place” (Rand, 540). And reflecting on the characters that Ayn Rand shows to have integrity all have that element in common, no matter if they’re a sculptor, architect, or construction worker. All the other characters, the ones that seem to reflect the opinions of those they’re around, as Dominique had shown Peter he did, are unhappy because of this lack of principles they held. On the note of the story, Gail and Howard begin to meet regularly and this connection between them puts strain on Dominique, watching the two become close. Gail does one thing for Howard and does not tell him about it, he tells Ellsworth not to write of Howard Roark, “Not a word. Not ever again” (Rand, 546). This shows how his individual desires are beginning to take over his desire for power through the Banner, and how his is symbolic of an inner change that has been happening since he met Dominique, but has sped its change since meeting Roark.
Peter Keating is feeling time pass him by, that it is all coming undone. His business is not as prosperous as it once was, his mother has come back to live with him, and he isn’t mentioned by Ellsworth in his column any more. To try and seal his career for the rest of his life, he wants one more project, the Cortlandt project, which was an attempt to make a very cheap housing for the underprivileged and poor. Keating tired to see if Ellsworth could get him the project, but he told him that he could not, but if he could make a good plan he could get it on his own. This change of help from Ellsworth shows how once someone’s usefulness to him, which is still not one hundred percent clear, is through, he discards them and moves on to someone else. Knowing that this was out of his reach, he took the plans and made an appoint to meet with someone who he had not seen in a very long time, Howard Roark. This shows Peters conflict not to be against society, but to fit in with it and become what he thinks they all want him to be. One other note of significance is that Peter goes out on his own to paint, something briefly mentioned in the beginning by Peter, “At one time he had wanted to be an artist. It was his mother who had chosen a better field in which to exercise his talent for drawing” (Rand 31), and he was now going back to it on his own time as a form of release for himself. The drawing were not good by his own standards, but it’s the beginning of an attempt at Peter to recover the self he had lost long ago as a child.

The Fountainhead P. 503-534

Howard is kept busy with his work in the beginning of this section. He is building a resort in a place called Monadnock Valley, and spends eighteen months building it. There are no ad’s or advertisements for the resort as its opening approaches, as the people who hired him set it up to fail, selling 200% of shares of the resort. Their plain fails, as the resort becomes greatly successful and its popularity makes it end up being booked a year in advance. While Howard did not care for what reason he got the commission, it does show the fight between him and a society that, this time, literally and directly set out to fail. With this commission though, his popularity spreads, because now people had heard his name, and “the simple fact that Roark had built a place which made money for owners who didn’t want to make money” (Rand, 513) caused him to get many small commissions that kept him busy. This struggle with society is not as important as his complete disregard for it; so long as he is allowed to do what he wants, he does not care.
Gail Wynand, the now wife of Dominique, meets with Roark to discuss him building a home for him, “because I’m very desperately in love with my wife” (Rand, 519). This brings out several conflicts all at the same time. Wynand afterward researches Roark, and discovers what his paper had done to his Stoddard Temple, and is torn between what he desires, and what is expected of the owner of the Banner paper. Howard is conflicted between his love for Dominique and his love for building, but being a man who truly loves to build at any cost, is able to push that out of his mind and accept the commission as he would have for anyone else agreeing to his terms. These conflicts in a way bring Wynand and Roark into conflict, as Wynand tried to bribe Roark, by telling him that, in exchange for this commission, he must become the Banner’s architect, and that would require making things the ways others would require. Roark tells him he’d accept, if he’d take his personal house made of the same butchered forms of art, and Gail admits defeat, knowing that Roark’s integrity cannot be budged.
The section ends setting up for more conflicts between desires and roles of society, as Gail invites Roark to dinner with him and Dominique, “I know she hasn’t been kind to you in the past – I read what she wrote about you. But it’s so long ago. I hope it doesn’t matter now” (Rand, 534). The conflict will be if Dominique feels the same way and if Roark was telling the truth when he replied it didn’t. Dominique is also only aware that Gail wishes to build a house, and does not know that he has picked an architect yet, or that it is Howard.

The Fountainhead P. 466-502

Ellsworth, Gus Web and others who think like them were at the meeting of many the American Writers guild. There they listen to the play of Ike, a writer of no talent who wrote a play with plots and goals that are horrendous and gruesome to the individual as they preach about equality in such a sense that it becomes disgusting. The writer critic Fougler tells him that he will produce the play, “because it is – as you put it – crap” (Rand, 469). They find joy not in promoting those of greatness, but promoting those who show no talent, so that they feel fulfillment in their own ego, as well as keep down others of actual great talent. By doing this they keep down those of greatness who would be truly happy doing what they love no matter what. Ellsworth and his friends all seem to not have joy other than suppressing those who are happy or elevating those that are miserable, just as they did as to Peter Keating as he dropped in on them.
The Wedding of Dominique and Wayward commences during this part of the play. Gail wanted it to be as brief as possible, with the single court judge and have the news dribble out. Dominique, in her attempt to torture him and herself by making it a public wedding and seeing if they can endure it. Going against his paper and everything it represents, Gail, banned the Banner from writing more than two lines on the last page of the newspaper.
Gail and Dominique continue to bond and openly express their way that they really feel. Gail mentions people like Dwight Carson as “the man I bought” (Rand, 496), because of his integrity for preaching the individual. After throwing enough money at him, Wayward made him write about the glory of society as a whole; not because he held personal convictions on that, but simply because it proved that he had the power to break the will of someone who had once shown integrity. He also mentioned his love for Dominique, which sounded as more of a selfish obsession where, “I love you so much that nothing can matter to me – not even you…Only my love – not your answer” (Rand, 502). This degree of affection, or rather obsession, and disregard for anyone’s opinion of it, even the target, shows a great degree of individualistic belief and personal fulfillment without care of the rest of the world that the author is trying to contrast with the preaching of loving every man as a brother that Ellsworth has so often preached and people like Peter Keating gobble up.

Fountainhead P. 418-466

Dominique and Keating begin to understand one another, and Keating begins to understand, in an instant, that Dominique is understood by Peter Keating, and understands that she is just showing the people around them how they are all void of ideas by simply agreeing with them. This understanding brings them closer, but is shattered in an instant by the arrival of Ellsworth, who informs Keating that he may be able to gain the large commission of Stoneridge from Wayward in exchange for letting Dominique go away with him for a week on his yacht.
Wayward does not seem to follow his usual routine with Dominique, but seems to fall in love with her. He even states outright to her, “I love you” (Rand, 448). Keating accepts a bribe of the Stoneridge commission, and then $250,000 from Wayward in exchange for divorcing Dominique. After a brief moment of rejecting the offer, Keating greedily accepts it.
Roark just slips by doing little jobs here and there. It seems to be that he’s hit a low in his career after the Stoddard Temple incident. He only shows up when Dominique finds him as he is redoing a house and she tells him of her marrying Wayward. This news actually triggers a physical response of shock and horror from Roark, even if for only a moment.