There comes a time when autumn asks, "what have you been doing all summer?"

Over the summer we read three books that all deal with prejudice and artistry. In Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, the nameless narrator was a black powerful and talented speaker that was trying to fit into a white society. In Power of One by Bryce Courtenay, Peekay is a white prodigy boxer in an African society during the time of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. And in The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, Howard Roark is a modern architect that is brought down by other architects and powerful figures in society. In The Fountainhead, Rand creates two characters; one describing her idea of the perfect man and the other what she despises in men. Howard Roark is the "perfect" man. He is not driven by emotions or by power. Roark does not base his work to please society. Peter Keating, however, sits on the opposite side of the spectrum from Howard Roark. Keating is very emotional and power hungry. He wants to please society and be highly thought of. His buildings reflect what he thinks other people would like best and not always what he thinks looks best. Throughout our socratic seminars, some of the questions focus on comparing and contrasting these two characters; their love life, their success, what they care about, how they define greatness, how they treat clients, their selfishness, etc. A big part of the book dealt with the power of media and how we judge people base on what people tell us. Reading the book as an outside character, we favor Howard and dislike Keating. But to the society within the story, they favor Keating because of what the media tells them. Dominque and Toohey write and hint to clients about how great Keating is. "He won an architect competition, he works for a big company, he's the guy you want to go to." While they bring down Roark saying his modern designs aren't good enough and impractical, turning people away from his business. I think we do that with the media today. In the grocery store, we're in the check out and we glance at the magazine stand. "...too skinny...divorce...pregnant...cheated...rage." The media uses these words to give us a negative view on celebrities and people in our society. Yesterday I went shopping with my mom and on the front cover of a magazine was Sandra Bullock who I actually like as an actress. They were bashing her for being too skinny and the amount of weight loss she's encounter and I automatically felt myself being turned off because she was losing so much weight despite the fact that I think she's a very powerful actress. The media does have a powerful effect on our society as well as Rand' society in The Fountainhead. Because of the media, Roark was brought down although he was a better architect than Keating. I think that's something very scary and something that we as a society who is tuned into the media need to be aware of. Not everything you read about is true, not everything you hear about is fact, and not everything you see is real.