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to censure, but his esthetics were unimpeachable. He exhibited sounder judgment

in matters of architectural merit than Mr. Austen Heller, the outmoded

reactionary who has suddenly turned art critic. Mr. Caleb Bradley was martyred

by the bad taste of his tenants. In the opinion of this column his sentence

should have been commuted in recognition of his artistic discrimination.

Monadnock Valley is a fraud--but not merely a financial one."

There was little response to Roark’s fame among the solid gentlemen of wealth

who were the steadiest source of architectural commissions. The men who had

said: "Roark? Never heard of him," now said: "Roark? He’s too sensational."

But there were men who were impressed by the simple fact that Roark had built a

place which made money for owners who didn’t want to make money; this was more

convincing than abstract artistic discussions. And there was the one-tenth who

understood. In the year after Monadnock Valley Roark built two private homes in

Connecticut, a movie theater in Chicago, a hotel in Philadelphia.

In the spring of 1936 a western city completed plans for a World’s Fair to be

held next year, an international exposition to be known as "The March of the

Centuries." The committee of distinguished civic leaders in charge of the

project chose a council of the country’s best architects to design the fair. The

civic leaders wished to be conspicuously progressive. Howard Roark was one of

the eight architects chosen.

When he received the invitation, Roark appeared before the committee and

explained that he would be glad to design the fair--alone.

"But you can’t be serious, Mr. Roark," the chairman declared. "After all, with a

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stupendous undertaking of this nature, we want the best that can be had. I mean,

two heads are better than one, you know, and eight heads...why, you can see for

yourself--the best talents of the country, the brightest names--you know,

friendly consultation, co-operation and collaboration--you know what makes great

achievements."

"I do."

"Then you realize..."

"If you want me, you’ll have to let me do it all, alone. I don’t work with

councils."

"You wish to reject an opportunity like this, a shot in history, a chance of

world fame, practically a chance of immortality..."

"I don’t work with collectives. I don’t consult, I don’t cooperate, I don’t

collaborate."

There was a great deal of angry comment on Roark’s refusal, in architectural

circles. People said: "The conceited bastard!" The indignation was too sharp and

raw for a mere piece of professional gossip; each man took it as a personal

insult; each felt himself qualified to alter, advise and improve the work of any

man living.

"The incident illustrates to perfection," wrote Ellsworth Toohey, "the

antisocial nature of Mr. Howard Roark’s egotism, the arrogance of the unbridled

individualism which he has always personified."

Among the eight chosen to design "The March of the Centuries" were Peter

Keating, Gordon L. Prescott, Ralston Holcombe. "I won’t work with Howard Roark,"

said Peter Keating, when he saw the list of the council, "you’ll have to choose.

It’s he or I." He was informed that Mr. Roark had declined. Keating assumed

leadership over the council. The press stories about the progress of the fair’s

construction referred to "Peter Keating and his associates."

Keating had acquired a sharp, intractable manner in the last few years. He

snapped orders and lost his patience before the smallest difficulty; when he

lost his patience, he screamed at people: he had a vocabulary of insults that

carried a caustic, insidious, almost feminine malice; his face was sullen.

In the fall of 1936 Roark moved his office to the top floor of the Cord

Building. He had thought when he designed that building, that it would be the

place of his office some day. When he saw the inscription: "Howard Roark,

Architect," on his new door, he stopped for a moment; then he walked into the

office. His own room, at the end of a long suite, had three walls of glass, high

over the city. He stopped in the middle of the room. Through the broad panes, he

could see the Fargo Store, the Enright House, the Aquitania Hotel. He walked to

the windows facing south and stood there for a long time. At the tip of

Manhattan, far in the distance, he could see the Dana Building by Henry Cameron.

On an afternoon of November, returning to his office after a visit to the site

of a house under construction on Long Island, Roark entered the reception room,

shaking his drenched raincoat, and saw a look of suppressed excitement on the

face of his secretary; she had been waiting impatiently for his return.

"Mr. Roark, this is probably something very big," she said. "I made an

appointment for you for three o’clock tomorrow afternoon. At his office."

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"Whose office?"

"He telephoned half an hour ago. Mr. Gail Wynand."

2.

A SIGN hung over the entrance door, a reproduction of the paper’s masthead:

#

THE NEW YORK BANNER

#

The sign was small, a statement of fame and power that needed no emphasis; it

was like a fine, mocking smile that justified the building’s bare ugliness; the

building was a factory scornful of all ornament save the implications of that

masthead.

The entrance lobby looked like the mouth of a furnace; elevators drew a stream

of human fuel and spat it out. The men did not hurry, but they moved with

subdued haste, the propulsion of purpose; nobody loitered in that lobby. The

elevator doors clicked like valves, a pulsating rhythm in their sound. Drops of

red and green light flashed on a wall board, signaling the progress of cars high

in space.

It looked as if everything in that building were run by such control boards in

the hands of an authority aware of every motion, as if the building were flowing

with channeled energy, functioning smoothly, soundlessly, a magnificent machine

that nothing could destroy. Nobody paid any attention to the redheaded man who

stopped in the lobby for a moment.

Howard Roark looked up at the tiled vault. He had never hated anyone. Somewhere

in this building was its owner, the man who had made him feel his nearest

approach to hatred.

Gail Wynand glanced at the small clock on his desk. In a few minutes he had an

appointment with an architect. The interview, he thought, would not be

difficult; he had held many such interviews in his life; he merely had to speak,

he knew what he wanted to say, and nothing was required of the architect except

a few sounds signifying understanding.

His glance went from the clock back to the sheets of proofs on his desk. He read

an editorial by Alvah Scarret on the public feeding of squirrels in Central

Park, and a column by Ellsworth Toohey on the great merits of an exhibition of

paintings done by the workers of the City Department of Sanitation. A buzzer

rang on his desk, and his secretary’s voice said: "Mr. Howard Roark, Mr.

Wynand."

"Okay," said Wynand, flicking the switch off. As his hand moved back, he noticed

the row of buttons at the edge of his desk, bright little knobs with a color

code of their own, each representing the end of a wire that stretched to some

part of the building, each wire controlling some man, each man controlling many

men under his orders, each group of men contributing to the final shape of words

on paper to go into millions of homes, into millions of human brains--these

little knobs of colored plastic, there under his fingers. But he had no time to

let the thought amuse him, the door of his office was opening, he moved his hand

away from the buttons.

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Wynand was not certain that he missed a moment, that he did not rise at once as

courtesy demanded, but remained seated, looking at the man who entered; perhaps

he had risen immediately and it only seemed to him that a long time preceded his

movement. Roark was not certain that he stopped when he entered the office, that

he did not walk forward, but stood looking at the man behind the desk; perhaps

there had been no break in his steps and it only seemed to him that he had

stopped. But there had been a moment when both forgot the terms of immediate

reality, when Wynand forgot his purpose in summoning this man, when Roark forgot

that this man was Dominique’s husband, when no door, desk or stretch of carpet

existed, only the total awareness, for each, of the man before him, only two

thoughts meeting in the middle of the room--"This is Gail Wynand"--"This is

Howard Roark."

Then Wynand rose, his hand motioned in simple invitation to the chair beside his

desk, Roark approached and sat down, and they did not notice that they had not

greeted each other.

Wynand smiled, and said what he had never intended to say. He said very simply:

"I don’t think you’ll want to work for me."

"I want to work for you," said Roark, who had come here prepared to refuse.

"Have you seen the kind of things I’ve built?"

"Yes."

Wynand smiled. "This is different. It’s not for my public. It’s for me."

"You’ve never built anything for yourself before?"

"No--if one doesn’t count the cage I have up on a roof and this old printing

factory here. Can you tell me why I’ve never built a structure of my own, with

the means of erecting a city if I wished? I don’t know. I think you’d know." He

forgot that he did not allow men he hired the presumption of personal

speculation upon him.

"Because you’ve been unhappy," said Roark.

He said it simply, without insolence; as if nothing but total honesty were

possible to him here. This was not the beginning of an interview, but the

middle; it was like a continuation of something begun long ago. Wynand said:

"Make that clear."

"I think you understand."

"I want to hear you explain it."

"Most people build as they live--as a matter of routine and senseless accident.

But a few understand that building is a great symbol. We live in our minds, and

existence is the attempt to bring that life into physical reality, to state it

in gesture and form. For the man who understands this, a house he owns is a

statement of his life. If he doesn’t build, when he has the means, it’s because

his life has not been what he wanted."

"You don’t think it’s preposterous to say that to me of all people?"

"No."

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"I don’t either." Roark smiled. "But you and I are the only two who’d say it.

Either part of it: that I didn’t have what I wanted or that I could be included

among the few expected to understand any sort of great symbols. You don’t want

to retract that either?"

"No."

"How old are you?"

"Thirty-six."

"I owned most of the papers I have now--when I was thirty-six." He added: "I

didn’t mean that as any kind of a personal remark. I don’t know why I said that.

I just happened to think of it."

"What do you wish me to build for you?"

"My home."

Wynand felt that the two words had some impact on Roark apart from any normal

meaning they could convey; he sensed it without reason; he wanted to ask:

"What’s the matter?" but couldn’t, since Roark had really shown nothing.

"You were right in your diagnosis," said Wynand, "because you see, now I do want

to build a house of my own. Now I’m not afraid of a visible shape for my life.

If you want it said directly, as you did, now I’m happy."

"What kind of house?"

"In the country. I’ve purchased the site. An estate in Connecticut, five hundred

acres. What kind of a house? You’ll decide that."

"Did Mrs. Wynand choose me for the job?"

"No. Mrs. Wynand knows nothing about this. It was I who wanted to move out of

the city, and she agreed. I did ask her to select the architect--my wife is the

former Dominique Francon; she was once a writer on architecture. But she

preferred to leave the choice to me. You want to know why I picked you? I took a

long time to decide. I felt rather lost, at first. I had never heard of you. I

didn’t know any architects at all. I mean this literally--and I’m not forgetting

the years I’ve spent in real estate, the things I’ve built and the imbeciles who

built them for me. This is not a Stoneridge, this is--what did you call it?--a

statement of my life? Then I saw Monadnock. It was the first thing that made me

remember your name. But I gave myself a long test. I went around the country,

looking at homes, hotels, all sorts of buildings. Every time I saw one I liked

and asked who had designed it, the answer was always the same: Howard Roark. So

I called you." He added: "Shall I tell you how much I admire your work?"

"Thank you," said Roark. He closed his eyes for an instant.

"You know, I didn’t want to meet you."

"Why?"

"Have you heard about my art gallery?"

"Yes."

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"I never meet the men whose work I love. The work means too much to me. I don’t

want the men to spoil it. They usually do. They’re an anticlimax to their own

talent. You’re not. I don’t mind talking to you. I told you this only because I

want you to know that I respect very little in life, but I respect the things in

my gallery, and your buildings, and man’s capacity to produce work like that.

Maybe it’s the only religion I’ve ever had." He shrugged. "I think I’ve

destroyed, perverted, corrupted just about everything that exists. But I’ve

never touched that. Why are you looking at me like this?"

"I’m sorry. Please tell me about the house you want."

"I want it to be a palace--only I don’t think palaces are very luxurious.