The novel’s theme is implemented in other ways as well. One important way in which the theme of The Fountainhead is expressed involves a new understanding of the false alternative between conformity and nonconformity. A conformist is one who lives with blind acceptance of the convictions and values of others. The beliefs of other people serve as his standard of truth. The conformist’s attitude is: “If you hold this to be true, then I believe it.” He does not possess the courage to base his choices on his own thinking; instead, truth is social to him. The conformist permits the dominant beliefs of his family or society to control him, and he exists as a follower. The conformist refuses to use his mind, abdicating the responsibility of thinking and uncritically acquiescing to the opinions of others. The Dean and Peter Keating are examples of conformity. Guy Francon (who adheres rigidly to the Classical style), Ralston Holcolmbe (who copies Renaissance designs), and John Erik Snyte (who panders to the public taste) are also examples of conformists in The Fountainhead. Real life gives us a multitude of examples of conformists: the family who, “wanting to keep up with the Joneses,” buys a new car or swimming pool because the neighbors have one; the teenager who knows drugs are dangerous but uses them anyway in order to gain acceptance from the peer group; the politician who surrenders his convictions because public opinion polls show they are unpopular; the student who aspires to study literature (or some other subject he loves) but gives it up because his family pressures him into medicine (or some other field it deems more appropriate). All of these, and numerous others, are conformists. The form in each case is different, but the essence remains the same. They all choose to follow others rather than be guided by their own judgment.
A commonly held belief is that the antithesis of a conformist is a nonconformist, but this is not the case. A nonconformist, too, allows others to dominate his life; that dominance merely takes a different form. A nonconformist lives in rebellion against the convictions and values of others. His attitude is: “If you hold this to be true, then I reject it.” The fundamental issue remains the same. The nonconformist, too, refuses to use his mind. He also abdicates the responsibility of thinking; instead, he uncritically rebels against the opinions of others. For him, as well as for the conformist, truth is social: In the nonconformist’s case, truth is the opposite of what his family or society believes. A nonconformist’s starting point of knowledge is the beliefs of others; this is the ruling concern of his life. A good example of a nonconformist in The Fountainhead is Lois Cook, the avant-garde writer who rebels against the rules of grammar in her writing and against the rules of personal hygiene in her grooming. Real-life examples are those modern artists who rebel against beauty by deliberately making their works as ugly as possible, and the hippies of the 1960s who lived in rebellious opposition to the values of their middle-class families. A nonconformist is a variation on the same theme as the conformist: Both seek fundamentally to identify the beliefs of others—the conformist to obey, the nonconformist to rebel. Neither is concerned with living by the judgment of his own mind.
But Howard Roark is neither a follower nor a rebel. He is an individualist, a man who relies on his own thinking to form his own conclusions. Such an independent person is not concerned with what others think—neither to obey nor to defy them; rather, he is concerned with what he thinks. History abounds with innovators who are perfect examples: Copernicus, Columbus, Edison, and others were creative thinkers, discoverers of new knowledge, not men taking public opinion polls, concerned with ascertaining the beliefs of society and acting based on the results.
Conformists like Keating and nonconformists like Lois Cook are cognitive dependents, relying on others for their grasp of truth. Individualists like Roark are cognitively independent; instead of looking to society for truth, they look at the facts. Independent thinkers understand that truth is a relationship between an idea and reality, not a relationship between an idea and the number of its devotees. The Roarks of the world recognize that if many people hold an idea, that makes the idea popular but not necessarily true. Millions of people, perhaps all of human society, once believed the earth is flat—but, as we know today, they were mistaken. Truth is objective; it is not collective or inter-subjective. An independent thinker’s devotion to the facts, not to the opinions of society, is what explains his ability to stand alone, often in the face of vehement antagonism. The conventional understanding that people are either conformists or nonconformists is inadequate. It overlooks the category of mankind’s best members: the independent thinkers.
The independent man’s unbreached commitment to the facts is shown in another important way. In response to the Dean’s claim that the rules of design come from the architects of the past, Roark states his thinking on the subject. “‘Rules?’ said Roark. ‘Here are my rules: what can be done with one substance must never be done with another. No two materials are alike. No two sites on earth are alike. No two buildings have the same purpose. The purpose, the site, the material determine the shape.’”
Roark’s first rule addresses the material out of which the building will be made. Each material has a definite nature, a specific physical makeup that enables it to do certain things but prohibits it from doing others. Wood, for example, is suitable for a single-story home or other types of small structures, but is inadequate for skyscrapers or suspension bridges. Steel and concrete, on the other hand, can be used for such purposes; their molecular structures are such that they can withstand the necessary stresses. Roark’s point is that advancing technology creates new materials that never before existed. Such substances as steel, aluminum, plastics, and glass were unavailable to earlier architects and make possible new types of designs. What is the logic, Roark asks, of copying the limited forms that were appropriate to wood when the new substances make possible so much more?
