A brief but wonderful discussion of a masterpiece

books:


	• Masterwork Studies Series - The Fountainhead: An American Novel (Masterwork Studies Series) Den Uyl Twayne Publishers, 1999 - 123 pages average customer review:based on 3 reviews
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A measured and very insightful treatment

Den Uyl has produced a unique treatment of this controversial book by its controversial, iconoclastic author. It is measured, analytical, showing a low-key but unobtrusive passion for his subject. The novelties of the analysis are wonderfully developed and will surprise many. Finally, no one will be able credibly to just dismiss Rand's writing any longer -- Den Uyl has identified The Fountainhead's merits without fawning or worship, based simply on the work's literary attributes.

At last academia is acknowledging a masterpiece!

This slim volume is authored in the cool, precise, meditative voice of academia. Den Uyl places Rand's novel in its literary, cultural, and philosophic context. He makes an interesting case for Dominique actually being the character most readers have the most in common with, and so, relate to the best. But most important, Den Uyl concludes his work by acknowledging that The Fountainhead is actually the mythical "Great American Novel" that so many literary types are always moaning for. Well, here it is, live and in-person, Den Uyl says, calling it the perfect novel about what is most essential to America: individualism. Nice to see an academic Ahab finally harpoon the "Great American Novel!"

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A brief but wonderful discussion of a masterpiece

I concur with Tibor Machan who writes at The Daily Objectivist website:"The bulk of Den Uyl's analysis shows that not only is Ayn Rand's book inspiring, as art often ought to be; not only is it philosophically meaty, as many classic novels surely have been; not only is it a brilliantly crafted story in which complex lives of characters develop in intriguing ways-but it is also a literary masterpiece, however much the major players in the literary culture may have ignored and sometimes demeaned it. Den Uyl's tone of understated respect and admiration is anything but fawning. Sadly, we have come to expect works on Rand's achievements-an example is the authorized documentary "A Sense of Life"-to be mostly uncritical, with shamelessly little if any attention to possible problems. Or else we see angry denunciations, which give Rand credit for nothing at all, let alone literary merit. This gentle but exacting discussion is a complete relief from both Rand partisanship and Rand bashing."

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The first, full-length analysis of Ayn Rand's most widely-read work.