The novel, Invisible Man, by author Ralph Ellison tells the story of the life of the narrator through his personal quest of gaining acceptance in society and finding an identity for himself. He remains nameless as he travels from the South, where he studies in a strictly college, to Harlem, New York, where he becomes acquainted with a cult, known as the Brotherhood. Throughout the novel, the narrator is shown to be invisible to the world around him because others fail to acknowledge his presence. As a result of this racially oriented society, he has no true self-identity. In the text, Ellison incorporates the use of motifs, or recurring events or elements, to help develop and elaborate on the novel’s central theme of racism. The use of blindness,
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Various events occur where this idea is exemplified. The reason for its recurrence is to illustrate how characters fail to acknowledge the realities. Certain members of the black community refuse to see the way the white race treats them because they want to believe that whites are treating them in a positive manner. In chapter one, the narrator and a group of black men are forced to take part in an event known as the battle royale. The black men fight in the battle royale wearing white blindfolds, which is symbolic of their powerlessness to realize how they are being exploited at the hands of the white man. The narrator stated, “All of us climbed under the ropes and allowed ourselves to be blindfolded with broad bands of white cloth…I felt a sudden fit of blind terror. I was unused to the darkness” (21). In essence, the black race does not have the ability to see how the white men treat them. In addition to this, Ellison uses other instances in the book where imagery of blindness surfaces. For example, in chapter sixteen the narrator experiences a sense of blindness when he is put to address a large, black audience at a city rally. In the speech, the narrator calls for an end to the blindness that causes the interracial divisions. However, this is ironic because the narrator cannot even see the audience because of the glaring lights. He essentially became what he didn’t want to become: a sightless leader of a blind audience. These two instances illustrate how the lack of ability to see reality contributes to black
Various events occur where this idea is exemplified. The reason for its recurrence is to illustrate how characters fail to acknowledge the realities. Certain members of the black community refuse to see the way the white race treats them because they want to believe that whites are treating them in a positive manner. In chapter one, the narrator and a group of black men are forced to take part in an event known as the battle royale. The black men fight in the battle royale wearing white blindfolds, which is symbolic of their powerlessness to realize how they are being exploited at the hands of the white man. The narrator stated, “All of us climbed under the ropes and allowed ourselves to be blindfolded with broad bands of white cloth…I felt a sudden fit of blind terror. I was unused to the darkness” (21). In essence, the black race does not have the ability to see how the white men treat them. In addition to this, Ellison uses other instances in the book where imagery of blindness surfaces. For example, in chapter sixteen the narrator experiences a sense of blindness when he is put to address a large, black audience at a city rally. In the speech, the narrator calls for an end to the blindness that causes the interracial divisions. However, this is ironic because the narrator cannot even see the audience because of the glaring lights. He essentially became what he didn’t want to become: a sightless leader of a blind audience. These two instances illustrate how the lack of ability to see reality contributes to black