This essay won the First Prize in the all India The Fountainhead Essay Contest 1999.
Roark says this when he is on trial for dynamiting the remodelled Cortlandt Homes structure and this is the central theme around which his defense of his actions, his motivation for doing what he did, in fact his justification of why he lives as he does live; and why he is what he is, lies. With this one sentence he bares his soul to everyone…… why he was expelled from Stanton…… why all his life he refused a number of steady jobs where he would he paid handsomely building structures to please his clients; who in turn could only be pleased if other people liked the building...... why he chose to go to Henry Cameron when he could have gone to almost anyone else…… why he, with nothing but his work as his companion was never unhappy whereas all the altruists with their supposedly burgeoning circle of close friends never seemed to find true happiness.
Fully conscious of the full meaning of his words, Howard Roark had used them as a slap to every man who had ever prostituted and continued to prostitute himself for the sake of others, and as a handshake to every man who had ever dared to stand alone, proud and independent. A slap of contempt; a handshake of respect and understanding. Roark also conveys that the worth of a man is decided solely on what he is for himself, what he would he in a world devoid of other people; the fact that he is liked by other people, that there are other people who think his work is good has absolutely no relevance in deciding his worth. The value of a human life should be decided solely on the independence, initiative, talent, and spirit of that single human and the hatred or love, respect or fear, anger or understanding of another human life towards the first has absolutely no bearing on the worth of the first life. The greatest gauge of virtue of a man is, actually the only gauge of human virtue is independence, what a man is for himself, his thoughts, his spirit, his love for his work and his independence in his life. Roark, in that courtroom, avenges every creator who ever had to be avenged, not with a conscious effort to do so but by just being himself and by saying aloud the fundamental tenets he had lived his life by and this in its eternal simplicity is what being independent truly means.
b) Dominique: Roark, I can accept anything, except what seems to be the easiest for most people: the half way, the almost, the just about , the in between.
Dominique Francon says this when she meets Howard Roark on the day following her marriage to Peter Keating; a statement of justification, of suffering, of pain and of enormous courage. Dominique's life before she met Roark had in its entirety been one almost full of suffering, devoid of any true meaning. She had lived alone, unsupported yet unbroken in a world where most men seemed to be affected by a truly vicious disease - one where they saw and where they envisioned success but did not want it and made no effort to strive towards it. She had lived, a colossus of strength, in a world where decadence was approved of, the vile was glorified, selflessness was revered, the "individual" was sniggered at and attaining success by one's own ability was almost a myth. She had survived, survived a world of cornerstore louts and complacent managers, of pleading beggars and whining editors and in their eyes she had seen indifference, they were beyond caring; in their eyes she had seen the look one sees in a dying man, ravaged by disease or in a starving animal, whipped, goaded to work harder. She had seen it and lived by it all and this statement of hers reflects that in not accepting their way of living, she had chosen the hardest way for fighting for her freedom, for her life, and, on her terms.
What she says explains why she married Peter Keating, why she modelled for Roark's temple, why she married Gail Wynand, why it had to he her who drew away the watchman from Cortlandt Homes when Roark was going to blow it up and why it had to be a woman of her character and of her strength with whom Roark would ever fall in love with. In choosing her way of fighting for her freedom from the world, she had left herself only two choices; either to destroy the hold the world had on her, which allowed her to be hurt by it and made her afraid of it for Roark's sake or get destroyed in trying. For Dominique Francon, newspaperwoman par excellence, ultramodern socialite wife of Peter Keating, glamorous treasure of Gail Wynand and lover of Howard Roark there would be no half way, no almost, no just about and definitely no in between.
c) Keating (to Roark): When I'm with you - its always like a choice. Between you and the rest of the world. I don't want that kind of a choice. I don't want to be an outsider. I want to belong.
Peter Keating, though he never admits it to himself had always worshipped Howard Roark. Right from their days together at Stanton Keating had loved and worshipped Roark in his mind, yet he consciously strove to destroy him. Even Keating, being the parasitic secondhander that he was, had a vague notion that there was an important difference between people like him and Roark. It was only with Roark that Peter Keating was truly himself, stripped of his pretensions and with no facade of people to hide behind, as other people had no significance in Howard Roark's presence. Through the shell of his sugar coated superficial world Peter Keating was dimly aware that he and Roark were not from the same mould; they were not and that they would never be and yet this statement of his reflects how much he wanted to belong.
When Keating was with Roark he was painfully aware of his existence, of himself, of his nature, of the common thread of guilt which bound him to his fellow-man and the kind of world of which he was a symbol. He knew that his kind of world and Roark could not possibly co-exist and thus whenever he was in Roark's presence he felt he had to choose between the world and Roark or rather between himself and Roark. With every fibre of his being Peter Keating knew that a "Peter Keating" and a "Howard Roark" could not, should not he allowed to exist on the same earth. Throughout the novel Keating tries to destroy Howard Roark, aware that Roark represents man as he could be and should be, and also fully aware that the closest he could come to belonging and identifying with people like Roark was directly intertwined with the destruction of himself and all he represented.
Copyright 1999. Liberty Institute
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