Session Ten: Ayn Rand

You will be relieved that this week you do not have a reading task, you simply have to come along to the session and enjoy (?!) a speedy rendering of Ayn Rand's book The Fountainhead as a movie. You should note that the tone here, that of the triumph of the individual against all odds. This is not the same as the heroism in the name other others that we have recognised in Le Corbusier- an architecture of tragedy. 

You should note that the publication of both book and film bracket the period when McCarthyism was prevalent in the USA; when previous allies became mortal enemies, and the 'red menace' had to be stopped in it's tracks. Ayn Rand became one of the doyens of 'neoliberalism', the ideology that has dominated our world following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

My own opinions on the Roark phenomenon are articulated in the Reputations feature in the December 2013 edition of Architectural Review.

Hint for Dissertation Ten: 

Clearly this vivid portrayal of the architect leads us in to discussion of the 'image of the architect' a subject well dissected by Andrew Saint in a book of the same name, and in my own 'Architects Guide to Fame'.