Im Email

Front 1

Chains (Tarp and Bledsoe)

Back 1

Upon arrival in the Brotherhood, he meets Brother Tarp and Brother Tod Clifton who give him a chain link and a paper doll, respectively. I choose to write about these items because they are symbolic of his struggle in his community fighting for the black people and of his struggle within himself searching for identity.

The narrator works hard for the Brotherhood and his efforts are rewarded by being distinguished as the representative of the Harlem district. One of the first people he meets is Brother Tarp, a veteran worker in the Harlem district, who gives the narrator the chain link he broke nineteen years earlier, while freeing himself from being imprisoned. Brother Tarp's imprisonment was for standing up to a White man. He was punished for his defiance and attempt to assert his individuality. Imprisonment robbed him of his identity which he regained by escaping and establishing himself in the Brotherhood. The chain becomes a symbol between the narrator and Brother Tarp because the chain also symbolizes the narrator's experience in college, where he was not physically chained down, but he was restricted to living according to Dr. Bledsoe's rules. He feels that he too escaped, in order to establish himself again (386). The narrator identifies with Brother Tarp because he too is trying to be an individual free of other people's control. He does not want to be seen as a tool to be exploited, but instead as a free-thinking human being. This chain which is an object of oppression becomes a symbol of the link between the two generations, passing on the legacy and pride of Brother Tarp's accomplishments . Tarp fought for his freedom and rights and now he is passing the chain onto the next generation who will take up his mission. Not only is this chain a symbol of the link between the two men, but it is also serves as a link to the past. Brother Tarp carries it around to remind himself of his imprisonment and his fight for freedom. Similarly, it reminds the narrator of his own past and of the circumstances of events that led to him ultimately working for the Brotherhood. It reminds the narrator of his grandfather, an individual repressed by the system who went through his entire life obsequiously saying yes to all the men in power. The narrator also spent his life trying to please his superiors and in the end he had lost his identity. He would follow instructions and became a tool to be exploited. For example, he aspired to emulate Dr. Bledsoe, but the older man used him to promote his own power. Additionally, the chain not only serves as a reminder of Tarp's fight against slavery, but is ultimately used as a weapon of defiance and an implement of strength, as it is used by the narrator during a riot. Just as Brother Tarp lashed out against slavery and the people that suppressed him, the narrator is metaphorically lashing out at the injustice that he has seen. He ultimately discovers that he and the people of Harlem have been used by the Brotherhood for the promotion of the institution's power and he is lashing out against this. During the riot, the narrator gets trapped in a hole where he decides to stay in isolation and search for his own identity.

Front 2

Optic white paint

Back 2

When he discovers that he is out of the drops that he is supposed to add to the paint mixture, the Invisible Man takes it upon himself to obtain more. 1984 is not so much about oppression among races, but classes. Bledsoe's quote to the narrator, "You're black and living in the South-did you forget how to lie?" This can be paralleled with the episode in Frederick Douglass's Narrative about how no matter what you thought, what the truth really was, or what really goes on, when a slave is asked by a white person how the master treats them, the best answer is to praise the master, because you never know who you are speaking to. As it had been for centuries, the black race was being dominated and oppressed by the white race. However, the naive narrator falls victim of the smooth-talking Bledsoe and issues Bledsoe his trust once again. He is able to locate two containers that contain black drops. The fact that the paint has the reputation for covering up almost anything is symbolic of America's solution to many of our problems. In many of the events that happened to our narrator, the end result was in some form or another, oppression. Not only that, but the author also shows that in order for the whites to achieve their goals, they depend on the help of the black race. "If it's Optic White, It's the Right White" This slogan bears much symbolism. An example is that many of our nations monuments are painted over with this "optic white" paint. In essence, the author is depicting that to have the best society, a blend of colors and people is needed. When the Invisible Man is taken to the buckets that contained a murky, brown looking substance, he is given the job of adding black drops to make the paint the "optic white". This paint is known for its ability to cover up or hide almost anything.

Front 3

The Underground

Back 3

The fact that the narrator of Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison must retreat underground before he is able to clearly realize himself fully and the inherent problems with the advice of his grandfather and Dr. Bledsoe is significant. In the outside world he is invisible and thus becomes all people at once while remaining nobody. The fact that he can easily be viewed in any number of roles marks his status as someone who only exists in outside manifestations rather than in substance. While in the outside world and faced with the decision between conforming to stereotypes versus acting of his own accord, he is particularly susceptible to influences because of the ingrained logic and advice of his grandfather and the example of Dr. Bledsoe. Although he realizes that he has the habit of acting the part, it is only through isolation that he can avoid this happening again.

Front 4

The Founder

Back 4

The fact that the narrator of Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison must retreat underground before he is able to clearly realize himself fully and the inherent problems with the advice of his grandfather and Dr. Bledsoe is significant. In the outside world he is invisible and thus becomes all people at once while remaining nobody. The fact that he can easily be viewed in any number of roles marks his status as someone who only exists in outside manifestations rather than in substance. While in the outside world and faced with the decision between conforming to stereotypes versus acting of his own accord, he is particularly susceptible to influences because of the ingrained logic and advice of his grandfather and the example of Dr. Bledsoe. Although he realizes that he has the habit of acting the part, it is only through isolation that he can avoid this happening again.

Front 5

The Golden Day

Back 5

The Golden Day, that IM was forced to take Mr. Norton to, symbolizes how a place can seem welcoming and wonderful just by the name. However the inside is far less splendid, such in the Golden Day's case, it was filled with crazy vets and prostitutes. The symbolic object is on the lines of irony, because it seems so wonderful, but is a rotten place to submitted to.
When Norton is being tended to at the Golden Day he receives a very powerful comment by Burnside, a vet/ doctor. Burnside comments that, "He's invisible, a walking personification of the Negative, the most perfect achievement of your dreams, sir! The mechanical man" (pg. 94). The mechanical man reference symbolizes how, though it seems IM is being treated right, he is actually moving to the controls of a higher power, he is a toy.

Front 6

Emma

Back 6

One of the first members of the Brotherhood the invisible man meets. The hero is skeptical of the Brotherhood's motives when he hears Emma ask, "But don't you think he should be a little blacker?"

Front 7

Hambro

Back 7

n Chapter 23, we finally meet the man responsible for the narrator's training. Brother Hambro turns out to be a tall lawyer who (no surprise here) thinks in incredibly macroscopic terms. He's the one to tell the narrator bluntly and repeatedly how "your members will have to be sacrificed." For what purpose? We never learn. As might be expected of the person training new recruits, Brother Hambro is the mouthpiece of the Brotherhood's abstract theories.

Hambro takes the invisible man through a four-month period of intense study and indoctrination after his arena speech to the Brotherhood to correct his "unscientific" tendencies. "A tall, friendly man, a lawyer, and the Brotherhood's chief theoretician." he tells the invisible man that "it's impossible not to take advantage of the people.The trick is to take advantage of them in their own best interest."

Front 8

Brother Tarp

Back 8

An old but ideologically vigorous member of the Brotherhood. "He can be depended upon in the most precarious circumstance," Brother Jack tells the invisible man. Brother Tarp hangs on the invisible man's office wall a picture of Frederick Douglass, which reminds him of his grandfather. Unlike the invisible man, who left the south more or less voluntarily, Brother Tarp was forced to escape to the north after spending nineteen years on a chain gang because "I said no to a man who wanted to take something from me." He gives the invisible man a link from his ankle iron as a keepsake.

Front 9

Brother Tobitt

Back 9

A Brother on the committee, he speaks up during the interrogation of the narrator concerning Clifton's funeral. The two are at odds as Tobitt feels he has greater liberty to speak from a black perspective since his wife is black, and uses this to arrogantly argue with the narrator over his motives.

Front 10

Brother Wrestwrum

Back 10

A Brother on the committee, he speaks up during the interrogation of the narrator concerning Clifton's funeral. The two are at odds as Tobitt feels he has greater liberty to speak from a black perspective since his wife is black, and uses this to arrogantly argue with the narrator over his motives.

Front 11

Mary Rambo

Back 11

Mary steps into the narrator's life after he leaves the hospital and is feeling faint. She takes him to her house until he feels better and offers him a place to stay permanently. Mary is a strong, independent woman who feels that it is very important that the narrator do something significant to further his race. Even when he cannot pay the rent, she continues to care for him, cook for him, and encourage him. After he must leave her to join the Brotherhood, the narrator often refers to a pull that he feels back to Mary's house whenever he is in a time of need.

Front 12

Booker T. Washington

Back 12

In 1933, he left Oklahoma to begin a study of music at the Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, Alabama. The Institute, which is now called Tuskegee University, was founded in 1881 by Booker T. Washington, one of the foremost black educators in American history, and became one of the nation’s most important black colleges. It later served as the model for the black college attended by the narrator in Invisible Man.

In the character of Dr. Bledsoe, the novel offers a vehement rejection of the philosophy of Booker T. Washington, which advocated that blacks should work toward economic success as a means of achieving racial equality. It also critiques, through the character of Ras the Exhorter, Marcus Garvey’s philosophy of black nationalism.

Front 13

Glass eye

Back 13

Blindness is the most obvious theme in Chapter 22, especially after Brother Jack's glass eye falls out. Symbolically, the glass eye means two things. One, Jack can only see what the Brotherhood wants him to see. In all other cases, he is blind to reality and the humanity of those he employs, particularly Invisible Man. Second, the glass eye incident also allows Invisible Man to realize that Jack does not necessarily see him as a human being: "... yes, and blindness; he doesn't see me. He doesn't even see me" (475). In Jack's mind, Invisible Man is not a human being but rather is only a speaker of the Brotherhood's ideals and goals. This realization causes Invisible Man to question Jack's ability to understand what is happening in reality, therefore increasing Invisible Man's awareness that the committee is not always interested in what is real.

Front 14

Clifton's funeral

Back 14

When the funeral procession reaches its end at a park, the narrator is asked to speak but much like his first speech with the Brotherhood, he has nothing prepared. Thus he must speak from his heart. The voice which speaks out of him struggles with the invisibility which is threatening to smother Clifton and his memory. In order to deny Clifton's erasure, he must give him a name. He begins nearly each part of his speech by directly naming Tod Clifton and then working to describe him as a man. He admits that Clifton had flaws but also blames the community who did not try hard enough to stop his death. He feels that the speech is failing because it lacks a political nature but it strikes the crowd because Clifton had gone beyond politics. He tried to pull the strings of the establishment as the white men did and was shot down. As the narrator notes, Clifton was full of illusions. In this sense, he ran from the cops but could not escape. Finally beginning to realize the significance of Clifton's fall, the narrator leaves the funeral and sees not a crowd but individual faces. The concentration in the masses instilled in him by the Brotherhood is beginning to leak away. Acting without the committee's permission, he feels the tension of his community and resolves to act on it.

Front 15

Lucius Brockway

Back 15

The basement symbolizes hell. It is no coincidence that the boss here is rather Satanic. His name is Lucius Brockway, an apparent derivative of Satan's real name, Lucifer. The other workers view Brockway as a traitor to blacks because he thought up the company slogan: If It's Optic White, It's the Right White This slogan implies that the right way to be is white. Brockway is very paranoid about losing his position of power; he is against the union because he feels it will attempt to eliminate him. He states that the paint would not be of the high quality it is if it were not for him; he is the "machine inside the machine" (217).

In the basement, IM is in charge of reading the pressures of various gauges. While retrieving his lunch from the locker room, he accidentally interrupts a secret union meeting. Suspicious of why IM is taking so long, Brockway reprimands him for joining the union. IM finds it difficult to convince him that he is not a member. An altercation ensues between the two, and IM is on the verge of beating Brockway's brains out when Brockway gives up.

Brockway looks at one of the gauges and hurriedly shouts to IM to turn it quickly. The fight has distracted them and the pressure is too great. Running for cover, Brockway flees the basement. Realizing too late what is about to occur, IM is caught in a massive explosion. He drifts through different states of consciousness and hears a voice saying, "these here young...boys ain't no good for the job. They ain't got the nerves" (230). IM feels an incredible defeat; it is the loss of his identity.

Front 16

Brer Rabbit

Back 16

The references to Southern folk culture in this chapter hearken back to earlier references of the same type, though they now have a different effect on the narrator. In Chapter 9, when the narrator meets the jive-talking Peter Wheatstraw and recalls Brer Rabbit and Brer Bear (two characters from folktales introduced to America by African slaves), the encounter makes him smile “despite himself” as he feels a flash of mixed pride and disgust. Now, however, the doctors’ inquiries about the folklore characters help the narrator to recover some of his memory. The narrator is reborn, but his heritage follows him into his new life. Yet, while he remains unable to shed his culture as he transforms his identity, he also proves unable to free himself from the burden of racism. For while Southern black folklore constitutes a rich part of who he is, it also differentiates him from white people, and the racist doctors use this difference as an excuse to violate the narrator and deny his humanity. Perhaps the most sinister manifestation of the doctors’ racism lies in the suggestion of castrating the narrator. Symbolically, to castrate someone is to strip him of his power, to strip him of his ability to leave a genetic legacy; a systematic castration of all black males would be tantamount to genocide.

Front 17

Battle Royal

Back 17

Despite his grandfather’s warnings, the narrator believes that genuine obedience will win him respect and praise. To some extent he is right, as the white men reward his obedience with a scholarship. Yet they also take advantage of his passivity, forcing him to take part in the degrading and barbaric battle royal. In addition to accentuating this tension between obedience and rebellion under the guise of obedience, the battle royal episode extends the novel’s motifs of blindness and masks. The boys’ literal blindfolding in the ring parallels the men’s metaphorical blindness as they watch the fight: the men view the boys not as individuals, but as inferior beings, as animals. The blindfolds also represent the boys’ own metaphorical blindness—their inability to see through the false masks of goodwill that barely conceal the men’s racist motives as they force the boys to conform to the racial stereotype of the black man as a violent, savage, oversexed beast. The narrator, blind in so many ways, has not yet learned to see behind the masks, behind the surfaces of things, behind the veils put up by white society. Only too late does he discover the falsity of the supposedly gold coins and of white generosity—the painful electric current running through the innocuous-looking rug.

Front 18

Yams

Back 18

In the opening of this chapter, Invisible Man is walking around the streets of Harlem in the midst of his first northern winter. While walking, Invisible Man sees an advertisement for a product that whitens the skin. This advertisement angers Invisible Man greatly. Invisible Man continues walking along and runs into a vendor selling yams, a traditional food of the south. As Invisible Man eats his yam, two important things occur: Invisible Man recognizes Dr. Bledsoe's disingenuousness and rejection of his past, and these yams confirm Invisible Man's own identity and heritage.