Excerpt from the novel - The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand

I have been reading the classic novel by Ayn Rand, called The Fountainhead. The basic premise is that there are 2 young men who are architects - Peter Keating and Howard Roark. They both have very different outlooks on life and how it should be lived. They, along with the many other characters who orbit around them, add colour and insightful commentary on human nature and how this affects the condition of their own lives and, ultimately, that of mankind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fountainhead

I find it to be a bit of a soap opera, BUT (and this is a big but), one that inspires or angers. It is a wonderful read and I have certainly come to identify with some of the characters for some of the wrong reasons. I also now aspire to emulate some of the qualities of the characters who maddened me.

I'd like to thank "L" for recommending this book to me. She told me that it changed her life, so as you could imagine, I had very little choice but to read it.

Here is the first of the excerpts I'd like to share with you...

"... If I found a job, a project, an idea or a person I wanted - I'd have to depend on the whole world. Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all so tied together. We're all in a net, the net is waiting and we're all pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it from your hands? You cant know, it maybe so involved and so far away, but someone is ready, and you're afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them - just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept."

"I take the only desire one can really permit oneself. Freedom."

"To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing."