Invisible Man Theme Essay

The theme for this story ‘Invisible Man’ can be of different things according to different people of course. But what I believe of what this theme is, it can be that the man is just trying to explain how it is to be him. By explaining, he is just stating a few examples, sometimes ‘jokes’ in his explanations. He begins to say how it can be an advantage for him, as in what he would be able to do. Of course he isn’t actually invisible, as he states in the beginning, “Nor is my invisibility exactly a matter of a bio-chemical accident to my epidermis.”. As I said, he begins stating how it can be an advantage, but only at night. He says a few things that hint towards this, such as, “One night I accidentally bumped into a man, and perhaps because of the near darkness he saw me and called me an insulting name.”, this is showing the dangers of being ‘invisible’, yet as he says there are a few advantageous. I’ve basically just explained what happens in the prologue, but the theme is still unknown. But as I said, he explains that he’s not actually ‘invisible’, that when he says that, people just don't see him and they see themselves and their surroundings only. All of this because of racism, basically stating that just because he’s African American walking around at night he is unseen. He then later attacks this person because he bumped into him then insulted …show more content…
Ralph Ellison was born in 1913 and grew up in poverty, it took Ralph 7 years to make the book. It’s as if he spent his whole life, using all the experience he had during those 7 years to put into the novel. The narrator starts to understand that he needs to develop his own identity and beliefs and that he’ll be no help to himself or anyone else if he prescribes one path to freedom for all people or blindly. He’s just a man who wanted to live simply but really couldn’t due to his skin color, racism,