orpheus

When I first read Anthem, when Rand describes the house Equality finds in the Uncharted Forest, the description of the house immediately made me think of Falling Waters by Frank Lloyd Wright. I dismissed the idea as mere coincidence. Afterwards I discovered that Rand did indeed admire Frank Lloyd Wright and even based her character Howard Roark loosely on him, which got me to thinking: Does anyone know of any evidence that Rand might have been inspired by Falling Waters when she describes the house in Anthem. The way the house seems to be built into the natural landscape itself and the flat roof and windows all around brought the FLW reference to mind: Then today, at sunrise, we saw a white flame among the trees, high on a sheer peak before us. We thought that it was a fire and we stopped. But the flame was unmoving, yet blinding as liquid metal. So we climbed toward it through the rocks. And there, before us, on a broad summit, with the mountains rising behind it, stood a house such as we had never seen, and the white fire came from the sun on the glass of its windows. The house had two stories and a strange roof flat as a floor. There was more window than wall upon its walls, and the windows went on straight around the corners, though how this kept the house standing we could not guess. The walls were hard and smooth, of that stone unlike stone which we had seen in our tunnel.

Thank you. This insight has broadened our discussion in many ways.

Time to revive an old thread. Obviously Rand wouldn't be interested in some of the more religious/spiritual beliefs of the transcendentalists, but there seems to be some beliefs they have in common, especially some of the following transcendentalist beliefs: Living close to nature Dignity of manual labor Need of intellectual companionships Humans are divine in their own right Self-trust and self-reliance Democracy Individualism – belief in yourself and your ideas Non-conformity I've searched but I'll ask again if Rand ever spoke/wrote of the transcendentalists and their fierce belief in individualism, non-conformity, and democracy. We're studying Anthem right now and want to use this as a springboard discussion for my students.