The novel's protagonist, Howard Roark, is an intransigent young architect who battles against conventional standards and refuses to compromise with an architectural establishment unwilling to accept innovation.

Ellsworth Toohey, a socialist architecture critic who uses his influence to promote his political and social agenda, tries to destroy Roark's career.

The novel attracted a new following for Rand and has enjoyed a lasting influence, especially among architects, entrepreneurs, American conservatives, and libertarians.

In early 1922, Howard Roark is expelled from the architecture department of the Stanton Institute of Technology because he has not adhered to the school's preference for historical convention in building design.

After taking a long vacation with Wynand, Roark returns to find that Keating was not able to prevent major changes from being made in Cortlandt's construction.

Wynand, who has betrayed his own values by attacking Roark, finally grasps the nature of the power he thought he held.

"[14] Architecture critic Martin Filler said that Roark resembles the Swiss-French modernist architect Le Corbusier more closely than Wright.

[24][26][27] Gail Wynand is a wealthy newspaper mogul who rose from a destitute childhood in the ghettoes of New York (Hell's Kitchen) to control much of the city's print media.

[19][41] He controls individual victims by destroying their sense of self-worth and seeks broader power (over "the world", as he declares to Keating in a moment of candor) by promoting the ideals of ethical altruism and a rigorous egalitarianism that treats all people and achievements as equally valuable.

[39][42] Rand used her memory of the democratic socialist British Labour Party chairman Harold Laski to help her imagine what Toohey would do in a given situation.

[30][31] When Rand first arrived in New York as an immigrant from the Soviet Union in 1926, she was greatly impressed by the Manhattan skyline's towering skyscrapers, which she saw as symbols of freedom, and resolved that she would write about them.

[44][45] In 1927, Rand was working as a junior screenwriter for movie producer Cecil B. DeMille when he asked her to write a script for what would become the 1928 film Skyscraper.

[a] Some passages were removed from the text prior to the publication, the most important of which concerns the relationship of Howard Roark with actress Vesta Dunning, a character that was cut from the finished novel.

[79] Philosopher Douglas Den Uyl identified the individualism presented in the novel as being specifically of an American kind, portrayed in the context of that country's society and institutions.

[80] Apart from scenes such as Roark's courtroom defense of the American concept of individual rights, she avoided direct discussion of political issues.

[95] Writing for the same newspaper, Orville Prescott called the novel "disastrous" with a plot containing "coils and convolutions" and a "crude cast of characters".

[94] A number of negative reviews focused on the length of the novel,[98] such as one that called it "a whale of a book" and another that said "anyone who is taken in by it deserves a stern lecture on paper-rationing".

[107] Feminist critics have attacked the scene as representative of an antifeminist viewpoint in Rand's works that makes women subservient to men.

[109] Susan Love Brown said the scene presents Rand's view of sex as sadomasochism involving "feminine subordination and passivity".

[112] Rand's posthumously published working notes for the novel indicate that when she started on the book in 1936, she conceived of Roark's character that "were it necessary, he could rape her and feel justified".

In an essay specifically explaining this scene, Andrew Bernstein wrote that although much "confusion" exists about it, the descriptions in the novel provide "conclusive" evidence of Dominique's strong attraction to Roark and her desire to have sex with him.

[119] In April 1944, she signed a multiyear contract with movie producer Hal Wallis to write original screenplays and adaptations of other writers' works.

[129] For example, journalist John Chamberlain credited these works with converting him from socialism to what he called "an older American philosophy" of libertarian and conservative ideas.

[1] In the United Kingdom, Conservative Party politician Sajid Javid has spoken of the novel's influence on him and how he regularly rereads the courtroom scene from Roark's criminal trial.

[132] Journalist Nora Ephron wrote that she had loved the novel when she was 18, but admitted that she "missed the point", which she suggested is largely subliminal sexual metaphor.

[140] In 1949, Warner Bros. released a film based on the book, starring Gary Cooper as Howard Roark, Patricia Neal as Dominique Francon, Raymond Massey as Gail Wynand, and Kent Smith as Peter Keating.

[159][160] After its debut the production went on tour, appearing in Barcelona, Spain, in early July 2014,[161] and at the Festival d'Avignon in France later that month.

[159] The play appeared at the Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe in Paris in November 2016,[162] and at the LG Arts Center in Seoul from March 31 to April 2, 2017.

[171] In a mixed review for The New York Times, critic Ben Brantley complimented Hove for capturing Rand's "sheer pulp appeal", but described the material as "hokum with a whole lot of ponderous speeches".

[172] A review for The Huffington Post complimented van Hove's ability to portray Rand's message, but said the play was an hour too long.