Howard Roark Character Analysis

Ayn Rand’s character Howard Roark possesses a strong devotion to his title as a creator who refuses to let his work or himself reflect the world and rather lets the world reflect him. His persistency comes across (reword) unrealistic to people as his capability to not let his true human spirit to be compromised by the world, people’s collective opinions, and societal norms is perceived as unattainable by people. A true expression of oneself, whether it be through music, writing, architecture, or any other forms of art, has never failed to become tainted and impressioned upon by society; Roark’s second employer Henry Cameron understood the importance of a man’s true ideas without the presence of worldly influence, how an idea kept protected

In that essence of a purpose, Roark was not created to be a realistic common day character, but as an unrealistic character that people, by comprehending Rand’s writing, can then make Howard Roark become realistic in their lives. He was not meant for humanity to see a reflection of themselves in, but as an unrealistic image that they must “...choose to move forward [and] translate… that experience into the actual course of [their] own life; or… spend the rest of [their] own life betraying it.” The norms that is naturalistic literature is challenged by the existence of Roark, and how his character thoroughly act’s out Rand’s belief that “[t]hat which is not worth contemplating in life, is not worth re-creating in art,”. Roark is an icon for all individuals who have lost their souls to the unified thought and inflicted norms that Roark is “...an entity complete in itself, an achieved, realized, immovable fact of reality...saying: [t]his is possible”.