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Example research essay topic: Man Mind Second Hand - 1,869 words

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... portable?" 37 For Roark, what is important is the building, and because Stoddard owns the building, there is nothing Roark can do to prevent its desecration. 38 Thus, it may be of some consequence that this trial, unlike the one to come, is between private parties. Yet another interpretation would suggest that the question whether what Roark designed and built is indeed a "temple" is one resolvable by a kind of direct perception, not requiring the mediation of verbal argument and therefore not an issue about which one can be persuaded. The question is determined by the nature of the soul of the decision-maker. Put another way, Roark's view may be that the building speaks for itself. Earlier in the story hen one of Roark's friends tries to persuade him of the importance of seeking out new commissions, Roark's response is characteristic: "What can I tell people in order to get commissions?

I can only show my work. If they don't hear that, they won't hear anything I say. " 39 In short, Roark regards the buildings he designs as living things; they speak for themselves, and there is nothing he can add to what they have to say. Thus, for Roark, the question to be decided by the trial is not susceptible to logical discourse. Indeed, words, language are irrelevant. [ 440 ] To attempt to defend the value of the Temple would be like trying to persuade someone that a particular color is red; there is nothing one can say but "Look. " Questions of this sort are not referable to law. Law is a process in which words are the coin of the realm. Its workings depend upon persuasion, rational discourse.

It is simply the wrong medium for defining things ostensibly. IV. THE SECOND TRIAL In a number of respects the Cortland trial is similar to the Stoddard trial: In both there is a torrent of pre-trial publicity (orchestrated by They); Peter Keating appears as a witness against Roark and is broken by the experience; and Roark refuses a lawyer and appears on his own behalf. The Cortland trial also differs from the Stoddard trial in Cortland is a criminal case in which Roark's liberty is at stake; if convicted, he will go to prison. Also unlike the Stoddard trial, here Roark's case is being tried to a jury, a jury that Roark has participated in selecting. He challenges potential jurors and selects a "tough-looking" group that the prosecutor believes a lawyer would have challenged in favor of gentler souls. 40 The jury appears attentive and emotionless.

Similarly, and unlike the judge presiding at the Stoddard trial, who was preoccupied with the appearance of female witnesses but otherwise uninterested, the judge presiding over the Cortland trial is described as "erect on the tall bench. He had grey hair and the stern face of an army officer, " 41 a man worthy of respect. This appears to be a more appropriate forum for Roark. There is little of the carnival atmosphere of the Stoddard trial, and there is a greater concern with facts, with objective reality. Thus, if one of the reasons for Roark's refusal to participate in the Stoddard trial was a notion that it would be futile to do so, there is less reason for such an assessment in the Cortland trial.

We might, therefore, expect Roark to be more involved in the trial. At the Cortland trial, unlike the Stoddard trial, Roark offers a verbal defense, 42 a long and sophisticated philosophical defense of his actions-indeed, of his way of life. If Roark's decision not to offer evidence at the Stoddard trial is an indication of his innocence, by the time of the Cortland trial, that innocence has been compromised by his [ 441 ] experience of the world. He has come to understand the principle behind men like Keating, a principle that had once eluded him. 43 It is this principle-selflessness, the absence of a genuine self-that Roark had failed to understand. Those like Keating "live within others. They live second-hand. " 44 It is against this way of life and in support of Roark's own commitment to individualism, reason and man's creative capacity on which Roark bases his defense.

The trial thus starkly pits two dramatically different philosophies against each other. The climax of the novel is an intellectual as well as a dramatic confrontation. (This integration of the dramatic and the philosophical is one of the character-isis of Rand's fiction. 45) The account of the trial opens with the prosecution's attack less on Roark's act than on his motive. Indeed, the first thing we hear from the prosecutor is that Roark's motive "will appear monstrous and inconceivable. " 46 That motive, of course, is egoism or as Roark had earlier put it, "[his] work done [his] way. " 47 That it was, of all things, a housing project that Roark had blasted away only served to compound the crime. The prosecutor's opening statement is well received by those in the courtroom. "They agreed with every sentence; they had heard it before, they had always heard it, this was what the world lived by... " 48 Yet it is this way of looking at the world, this conception of morality that Roark, in his turn, will challenge in the courtroom, as he has by the manner in which he has lived his life. On the first day, as at the Stoddard trial, a parade of witnesses testify against Roark. Unlike the Stoddard trial, however, these are fact witnesses.

The subject of their testimony concerns an account of what happened: the police officer's account of Roark's arrest, the night watchman's account of being sent from the scene, the contractor's account of dynamite missing from the site, and so on. On the following day, Keating is called to testify to his arrangement with Roark, presumably to establish Roark's motive. Keating recounts how it was Roark that designed Cortland on the condition that it be built exactly as he designed it, but Keating is a broken man. Testimony that it was thought would create a sensation falls somewhat flat, as if no one is on the witness stand, much less a famous architect confessing his own incompetence. [ 442 ] After Keating's testimony, the prosecution rests. Roark calls no witnesses but combines his own testimony and his closing argument. Roark refers to this as "[his] testimony and [his] summation, " 49 and both words are apt.

The speech is his testimony as much in the religious as in the legal sense, and the speech is the summation of all that we have learned from reading Roark's story. It is, as well, the dramatized philosophical focus of the novel, and its immediate aftermath-his acquittal-is the book's climax. It is here that Roark, obviously speaking for Rand, justifies a morality of individualism, reason and creative work. Roark begins, "Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire.

He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. " 50 The relationship between the creator and those lacking the ability and independence to create is the starting point of Roark's testimony. His first several paragraphs are focused upon the un submissive creator who, throughout history, contributes enormously to the progress of the human race and is made to pay a high price for his contribution. Yet it was the creator who ultimately prevailed. The motive of the creator, Roark explains, is not primarily the welfare of others. Instead it is the realization of his own vision: "His truth was his only motive...

A symphony, a book, an engine, a philo-sophy, an airplane or a building-that was his goal and his life... The creation, not its users. The creation, not the benefits others derived from it. " 51 And this vision, this creative impulse is, for Roark, a creature of the self. "[O]nly by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. " 52 These achievements are the product of man's mind, his means of survival. Every living thing has attributes equipping it for survival.

Animals have claws or fangs or horns. Man has his mind. But the process of thought, the exercise of man's mind is not a collective process. "[T]he mind is an attribute of the individual. " 53 Because man must produce what he requires for his survival, his only choice is to create or to feed off the creation of others. The creator requires independence; his concern is with the conquest of nature.

The parasite lives second hand, originating nothing; he requires relation-ships with others to insure his survival. The creator is not concerned [ 443 ] primarily with others. For the second-hander, dependence is a virtue. Thus, the parasite's moral code demands that man live for others. "Men have been taught that the highest virtue is not to achieve, but to give.

Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. " 54 The only choice offered by the culture, as models of good and evil, is the choice between self sacrifice and the sacrifice of others to one's self-a choice between masochism and sadism. But both are variations of dependence on others. What Roark offers instead is a version of independence, freedom from the claims of others. "The choice is not self-sacrifice or domination. The choice is independence or dependence. " 55 Thus, the measure of a man is not his relation to others, but what he is and has made of himself. "In all proper relationships there is no sacrifice of anyone to anyone. " 56 The proper relationship of one person to another is that of traders to mutual advantage. Roark concludes by relating these rather abstract notions to the dynamiting of Cortland. He reminds his audience that his price for Cortland was to see it built precisely as designed and that he was not paid. 57 And though he is charged with destroying a project conceived for the poor, he points out that but for his design the poor could not have had this particular shelter.

I came here to say that I do not recognize anyone's right to one minute of my life. Nor to any part of my energy. Nor to any achievement of mine. No matter who makes the claim, how large their number or how great their need. I wished to come here and say that I am a man who does not exist for others... I wished to come here and say that the integrity of a man's creative work is of greater importance than any charitable endeavor. 58 Even today, this is pretty heady stuff.

At the time of the book's publication, in a much more leftward leaning collectivist political climate, it was shocking. What is remarkable, therefore, is how persuasive it was and how influential it remains. It was persuasive to the jury as well. Although there was an expectation that the jury would deliberate for some time, they were barely out of the box-indeed, Roark [ 444 ] had not yet left the courtroom-when it was announced that the jury had reached a verdict. Ro...


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Research essay sample on Man Mind Second Hand

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