According to the Bible, the harbingers of the Apocalypse are the Four Horsemen – Conquest, Pestilence, War and Famine. This is exactly what I was reminded of by the four characters whose names the parts of the Fountainhead carry. Those characters are Peter Keating, Ellsworth Toohey, Gail Wynand and Howard Roark. These men are exactly the harbingers of an Apocalypse, but their names should be Mediocrity, Manipulation, Materialism and Apathy.

Peter Keating

Peter Keating is the ultimate form of the ordinary, spineless person. He is in no way capable of being a true enemy to anyone else. Unrealistically pathetic, one might think, but unfortunately that is not the case at all. In fact, people are just as weak and superficial and drag society down in the same way. Even when Ellsworth explained his ideology to him, he still couldn’t change. Ellsworth tells Peter that now he will know the truth and still obey because he is no longer fit for anything else. With this line, Ayn Rand says the same thing to every reader.

Ellsowrth Toohey

In the character of Ellsworth Toohey, I once again find myself faced with a question I cannot answer: how is it possible to bear crushing people who are far inferior to you? I understand the tactic of then using them against the powerful (which he did very well against Gail), but to surround yourself with them for years… it’s just not worth it. Ellsworth is the ultimate evil, and from that point of view, he deserves credit. He is the true enemy of every self-aware person. And his logic, “I want everyone to be pathetic so that I can rule them and be the most pathetic of them all,” sums up everything anti-human in Ayn Rand’s work. This is a very good lesson for many people: the only way to be at the top of society is to crawl at the feet of every member of it.

Gail Wynand

The first aspect of Gail – the person who owns the most disgusting newspaper that could ever exist. A newspaper which humbles beauty, propagates mediocrity, and inferior values and idolizes the common. And he does all this just to have money and power. I can only say: hideous. When Gail appeared in the book, I was ready to hate him. But he had a second aspect – in fact, he is great. He publishes this newspaper, although he knows what kind of trash it is and what the truth is. This makes him the most worthy of detesting creature in the world. I can’t think of anything more disgusting. He is actually so horrible that I like him. Although he has spirituality, he voluntarily becomes a symbol of mediocrity. This is pathetic but at the same time heroic. The difference between him and Ellsworth is that for himself, Gail keeps greatness on the pedestal and he wants to save every worthy person and not to destroy them (whether Howard and Dominique are really worthy is another question). But the most interesting thing about Gail was how he treated those who had the chance to be valuable—the young, the ambitious, the dreamers—he simply trampled on them, forcing them to betray everything they believed in. And, yes, he has the right to do so, because that proves that they were not valuable after all.

Gail was worthy of respect when he single-handedly kept the newspaper working for three months. He knew that the Banner represented everything he hated; he knew it was hopeless; he even knew that he wasn’t accomplishing his goal but harmed Howard, but he kept doing it anyway. If his story had ended here, he would have been included in my list with great characters. But, of course, since he is a character created by Ayn Rand, this cannot be the case. His fire disappeared and he let the striking people win. His small victory over Ellsworth was insignificant. The closing of the newspaper came too late. He deserved a punishment as the one received by Howard and Dominique. But he didn’t deserve to be punished by people like them.

Howard Roark

Aaand we reached Howard Roark. The one who Ayn Rand pointed to as the person who we all must admire. I liked how simple was the criteria for the positive characters in this book: do they like Howard or not. Howard may have been great but he did not care about anything. The whole time he propagated that pain should only reach one point but not go deeper. Well, my dear Howard, there is no such thing as half a pain. The same way there isn’t half a love, half a happiness and half a faith. And that’s not the only thing. In a horrible way, Howard managed to put beauty against freedom. Such a battle does not exist in nature, it is simply wrong. The joke which Ayn Rand makes with the readers using Howard deserves admiration. She points at him as the model for the Overman in exactly the same way in which Ellsworth points at Peter. The goal is that we start to want to be like Howard. Be careful!

We should mention Dominique as well. The interesting thing about her is that she intentionally dived in the lives of Peter and Gail, desiring only that they destroy her, but the only one who destroyed her was Howard when she dived into his life. His aim was to teach her not to care so much and to let pain only to a certain point. She achieved that and transformed into a creature with no feelings. And maybe she had the chance to love.

Mediocrity, Manipulation, Materialism, and Apathy. The Fountainhead warns against them but idolizes them. They are presented as enemies aiming to delude the reader but in fact, they have a common goal – deviation from the truly meaningful things. The most important thing is that there isn’t a smaller evil as they are all equal.

P.S.:

By the way, the Rennaisance, the Gothic and the Clacissism styles are great. The modern architecture styles should try to reach their class. And, as we know, not everyone is Gaudi.