Review by plotvariant - The Fountainhead

plotvariant 's review for:

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

DNF

I was genuinely enjoying the small amount of The Fountainhead that I had read until I encountered the

rape scene

. After hearing about it, I decided to look it up — and it was there, for no clear reason. The moment was jarring, unnecessary, creepy, and semi-graphic, and it completely shifted my experience of the book. I couldn't finish it after that.

Dominique's assault

and the fact that

she later marries Roark — the protagonist/rapist

— left me feeling deeply uneasy. It’s hard to reconcile this with the book’s themes of individualism and integrity, which were already questionable to me. I was honestly left questioning what message Ayn Rand was trying to send with that plot "point."

Content Warnings