People have been at this game for longer than they've been casting Atlas Shrugged, but, since SOLO is in a literary mode these days, we might do well to start again.
Rand often used recognizable celebrity or public-figure images in creating her characters. A full list, in one place, would be worth keeping. My conjectures are below; I'd be interested in seeing more. * indicates a borrowing that she acknowledged. These are all public figures, not just people she knew personally (though she did meet a few of them). Most get a mention in her published writings or her letters or journals at one time or another.
IDEAL
Kay Gonda Greta Garbo
(the flashy preacher) Aimee Semple McPhearson
HER SECOND CAREER
Winston Ayers Noel Coward
(the star she trades places with) Any of a number of silent-era stars known mainly to historians. Leatrice Joy? Clara Bow? Louise Brooks?
(the director) Ernst Lubitsch, Erich von Stroheim; more likely the first, because she was a self-professed fan
THE NIGHT OF JANUARY SIXTEENTH
Bjorn Faulkner Ivar Krueger *
THE FOUNTAINHEAD
Howard Roark Frank Lloyd Wright
Ellsworth Toohey Harold Laski*, Lewis Q Mumford (footnote: Mumford was the Librarian of Congress who wrote her in the 60s to ask for the donation of her manuscripts)
Austen Heller H.L. Mencken
Gail Wynand W.R. Hearst, Henry Luce*
Lois Cook Gertrude Stein
Henry Cameron Louis Sullivan
Peter Keating Raymond Hood*, Henry Peterkin, various others she mentions in her preparatory notes
THE FOUNTAINHEAD outtakes
Vesta Dunning Katherine Hepburn
ATLAS SHRUGGED
Mr. Thompson Harry Truman*
Kay Ludlow Greta Garbo
Writer/fisherwoman Ayn Rand
Robert Stadler Robert Oppenheimer*
(Edited by Peter Reidy on 9/21, 6:05pm)
(Edited by Peter Reidy on 9/22, 12:16pm)
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