Invisible Man

By Ralph Ellison
Presentation by Chris Berry, Lauren Close, and
Amanda Mahoney
 The Invisible Man feels superior to the other black men who are to participate in the battle
royal because they do not feel that they have to please the white men as he does
o “I had some misgivings over the battle royal, by the way. Not from a distaste for fighting,
but because I didn’t care too much for the other fellows who were to take part. They
were tough guys who seemed to have no grandfather’s curse worrying their minds.” (p.
17-18)
 REMINDER: Grandfather’s Curse= please the white men (p. 16)
o The Invisible Man also references Booker T. Washington as if he is the talented tenth of
the group
 He makes the tenth fighter and is apparently the most intelligent, or most
recognized by white men as someone with “potential,” however, he is the
lowest in the group of ten.
 “I suspected that fighting a battle royal might detract from the dignity of my
speech. In those pre-invisible days I visualized myself as a potential Booker T.
Washington. But the other fellows didn’t care too much for me wither, and
there were nine of them. I felt superior to them in my way, and I didn’t like the
manner in which we were all crowded together in the servants’ elevator.” (p.
18)
 “From a vantage point later in time, the narrator remembers that as a
young man about to graduate high school, "I visualized myself as a
potential Booker T. Washington," who hoped to follow his idol's advice
and perhaps emulate his career.1 The most suc cessful Negroes, he
believed, were those who proved themselves essential to white society,
either because they had an employable trade or because they helped
keep order within the Negro community.” (Kostelanetz 2)
 “At the base of Washington's (and the Invisible Man’s) politics, then,
was a faith that Southern whites would give the respectable Negro a fair
opportunity to succeed, and honor whatever success a Negro achieved
for himself.” (Kostelanetz 2)
 Samuels explains the elevator as a metaphor to slavery and the “Middle
Passage.” He states, “The youths are crowded together into an
elevator, suggestion the involuntary nature of their movement and
experience.” He later states, “In a like manner to that of former slaves
ascended the decks of slave ships to descend into their holds and then
be discharged into the very bowels of slavery, the youths, ascending the
elevator, are in fact descending into the very dungeon of segregation
where their ascribed social place is identified and taught by local
cultural bearers.”
 The White elite of the town watch the entertainment unfold as they pit the black boys against
one another in a “free-for-all”
o The battle represents white men in society’s enjoyment to keep black men in a low,
dark, state of mind; they want the blacks to be blind, confused, inferior, and afraid.
 Narrator mentions not ever experiencing darkness before and how it scared him
 “All ten of us climber under the ropes and allowed ourselves to be blind-folded
with broad bands of white cloth. One of the men seemed to feel a bit
sympathetic and tried to cheer up us as we stood with our backs against the
 ropes. Some of us tried to grin. “See that boy over there?” one of the men said.
“I want you to run across at the bell and give it to him right in the belly. If you
don’t get him, I’m going to get you. I don’t like his looks.” Each of us was told
the same.” (p. 21)
 “But now I felt a sudden fit of blind terror. I was unused to darkness.” (p.21)
 “It foregrounds the practices of white society of channeling the Negros'
anger and frustration against each other, inflicting violence and self-
destruction, thus driving them further away from their common goal.
The endless replication of mirror images purporting to "better the
system" leads only to entropic decline. As the second part of the novel
clearly shows, the structure and the functions of the Brotherhood,
whose historical prototype is believed to be the Communist Party, is the
extreme example of such politics of division and domination, which
ultimately bring disintegration. “( Krasteva 8)
 “ Everyone fought hysterically. It was complete anarchy. Everybody fought
everybody else. No group fought together for long. Tow, three, four, fought one,
then turned to fight each other, were themselves attacked. Blows landed below
the belt and in the kidney, with the gloves open as well as closed” (p. 23)
 “This incident, like most of the major scenes in the book, embodies a
symbolic dimension that complements the literal action; that is, the
scene stands for something larger in the experience of the Southern
Negro. Here, Ellison shows how the white powers make the Negroes
channel their aggressive impulses inward upon their own race instead of
upon their true enemy, who remains on the sidelines, supervising the
fray to make sure the violence is directed away from themselves.”
(Kostelanetz 8)
 Samuels says, “The protagonist and company ‘awaited their opportunity to
entertain ‘the most important men of the town’’”. As lower race and class than
the rich business men and higher ranking men of the town, the black adolescent
boys were merely invited to fight the battle royal in an effort to keep the “higher
up’s” entertained. It was not ever really important that I.M. was going to give a
speech, but that he was the tenth body for the royal.
 Superintendent asked him to come, put him in the fight, in this position of
blindness, but the sound of his voice is something I.M. still clings to for comfort.
Those who control him at the same time comfort him?
 School Superintendent: Reigns in control at school and at the battle royale.
Amid both order and chaos. Whiteness continually controlling black life.

 Blonde Woman
o The woman is a vision of America, but also a vision of white control. She embodies the
American dream in that the men want her and crave her and eventually control her.
The Invisible man wants to see her, fell her, hurt her, have her, etc. Maybe this is his
view on America. He wants the freedoms, etc, but has no way to get them so he desires
to destroy it.
o “My teeth chattered, my skin turned to goose flesh, my knees knocked. Yet I was
strangely attracted and looked in spite of myself. Had the price of looking been
blindness, I would have looked. The hair was yellow like that of a circus kewpie doll, the
 face heavily powdered and rouged, as though to form an abstract mask, the eyes hollow
and smeared a cool blue, the color of a baboon’s butt.” (p.19)
 “The invisible man is both attracted and repelled by "the magnificent blonde"
who is "stark naked." He wants "to caress and destroy her, to love her and
murder her, to hide from her, and yet to stroke where below the small
American flag tattooed upon her belly her thighs formed a capital V"(l6).
Significantly, the blonde stands both for the woman in the ritual and for
America itself.”( Krasteva 7)
o “ I wanted to at one and the same time to run from the room, to sink through the floor,
or go to her and cover her from my eyes and the eyes of others with my body; to feel
the soft thighs, to caress her and destroy her, to love her and murder her, to hide from
her, and yet stroke where below the small American flag tattooed upon her belly her
thighs formed a capital V.” (p. 19)
 “In the same way in which the woman lures the boy into the secrets of
manhood, America lures him with the promise of opportunity and equality. If he
yields to the temptation, in both cases he is more likely to meet his death than
to acquire manhood or social or economic fulfillment. Hence the mixed feelings
of attraction and repulsion, love and hate, escape and commitment. The
dominant feelings are fear and guilt, not confidence and pride, as we would
expect in the traditional ritual. The black boys are denied their manhood, while
the white men reassert their own by physical contact with the naked woman:
"they tossed her as college boys are tossed at a hazing"(17). It is an act which
substitutes for the actual experience of intercourse. The whole episode enacts
the ritual of castration, anticipating the castration dream scene later in the
novel. “( Krasteva 7)
o The woman is a vision of America, but also a vision of white control. She embodies the
American dream in that the men want her and crave her and eventually control her.
The Invisible man wants to see her, fell her, hurt her, have her, etc. Maybe this is his
view on America. He wants the freedoms, etc, but has no way to get them so he desires
to destroy it.
o How could she see him if she has hollow, impersonal eyes?
o The cigar smoke clings to her. Whiteness clinging to her? She is praised because she is
white? Or because she is female.

 Electrified Rug
o Also the scene with black men rushing to collect the money on an electric rug shows
desperation and greed, feeding on stereotypes
o “As told, we got around the square rug on our knees. Slowly the man raised his freckled
hand as we followed it upward with our eyes.

I heard, ‘These niggers look like they’re about to pray!’

Then, ‘Ready,’ the man said. ‘Go!’
I lunged for a yellow coin lying on the blue design of the carpet, touching it and
sending a surprised shriek to join those rising around me. I tried frantically to remove
my hand but could not let go. A hot, violent force tore through my body, shaking me like
a wet rat. The rug was electrified. The hair bristled up on my head as I shook myself free.
My muscles jumped, my nerves jangled, writhed. But I saw that this was not stopping
the other boys.” (p. 27)
  To pay for the "entertainment," the hosts put numerous coins and bills upon a
rug and encourage the Negroes to pick up "all you grab. Once this new contest
starts, they discover the rug is electrified. The shocks lead the boys to jump and
shriek, in animal-like movements, to the amusement of the white audience.
"Glistening with sweat like a circus seal and . . . landing flush upon the charged
rug," one boy "literally dance [d] upon his back, his elbows beating a frenzied
tattoo upon the floor, his muscles twitching like the flesh of a horse stung by
many flies." In other words, before the Negro receives the pay he earned, he
must overcome unnecessary hazards, often arbitrarily imposed, and publicly
make a fool of himself. Between the Negro and the money he earns from white
society are, symbolically, all the galvanic terrors of an electrified rug; and the
price f the white man's pay is the Negro's de basement of his humanity. “
(Kostelanetz 8-9)

 Blindness
o Represents the whiteness that black people face daily
o Shows a lot of blindness experienced by the Invisible Man
o The blindfolds are symbolic, showing the people involved and their refusal to admit
their faults and the truth about themselves or the society around them
o Shows their weakness to realize they’re being exploited by white people
o Blind to the embarrassment they represent to their own race
 “The black boys are blindfolded and made to fight each other. The narrator
loses all sense of direction and is rendered extremely vulnerable: "Blindfolded, I
could no longer control my motions. I had no dignity. I stumbled like a baby... A
glove connected with my head, filling my mouth with warm blood"(19). In the
second stage of debasement the blindfold and the blood allude to the ritual
sacrifice. The fighters are completely dehumanized, for they are reduced to the
status of the sacrificial animal in the tradition of the cockfights and the
bullfights. What Twitchell has to say about adolescent males in the liminal
period is quite relevant to this episode, for liminality constitutes its narrative
focus: "the group in exile suffers from a lack of identity, a breakdown of self-
consciousness, while there is at the same time the concomitant congealing
power of the group"(34). “( Krasteva 7)
 ANIMAL REFERENCES:
o Baboon-white girl dancer, Baboons are used a reference for someone less intelligent, ex,
if you call someone a baboon, they are un-intelligent and un-civilized. They are also
kept on display at zoos, etc for people to come and watch/observe.
o Intoxicated Panda- Pandas are usually seen as peaceful and passive. Only when
threatened do they attack.
o Howling- Like wolfs the men “howel” and chase after the girl as she dances around the
room. If they are not chasing her they are watching her, as if a wolf stalks it’s prey
before the attack.
o Poisonous cottonmouths- about to fight, I.M. feels like he is trapped with cottonmouths.
He is surrounded by men waiting to attack him.
o Crabs-the boys were crouched down like crabs to protect their mid-sections. Also crabs
are bottom dwellers, so maybe to the white men the black boys are feeding off their
 fortune for the night in an effort to earn some money. Although crabs are bottom
dwellers (feeding off the trash of others) they are a expensive and enjoyed sea-food.
o Snails-the boys were trying to feel their way around with their gloves like a snail does
with his feelers. Snails are also slow, maybe a reference to how the white man sees the
black boys, as slow and below them.
o Butterfly- his blood takes the shape of a butterfly. Has he transformed? The butterfly
transforms after it cocoons itself. Is he about to experience change?
o Rat-when the fighters are fighting for money, he shakes like a wet rat. Rats are seen as
dirty and thieving (they take trash). They are also typically full of diseases.
o Flesh of a horse- being stung… not sure if that really means anything
 Battle Royal Signifying Slavery
o Ellison also mentions their upper bodies touching and the sweat they all have,
explaining the hot nature of the elevator and the confined movements of the guys’
bodies. There is no room for them to move and they all experience an invasion of
personal space.
o Ellison also explains the boys experience with blindness when he discusses them not
being able to see what was going on up front. “Something we could not see was going
on up front. A clarinet was vibrating sensuously and the men were standing up and
moving eagerly forward. “ And later says, “while up front the big shots were becoming
increasingly excited over something we still could not see.” (18) Samuels comments on
this moment by saying, “Furthermore, in a similar manner that the Africans were taken
into a foreign culture by the ships, they youths rushed from the elevator into a rococo
hall, were taken into a world that heretofore had remained unknown to them.” (p. 50)
o So the boys are placed into a situation of uncertainty, like their ancestors, and are later
put up in front of all the white men, not to be bought as their predecessors were, but to
fight and serve as a form of entertainment to the upper-class white men.
o Samuels makes his final comments on the battle royal and the mirrored hallway the
boys travel through and says, “Capturing their reflected experience, the mirrored hall
starkly suggests as much, indicating the failure of time to bring about significant
changes in the condition of their race.” He also states, “ Remaining frozen in time in
their reflected images, the youths are captured retrospectively through time and in
space to join their forefathers.” (50)
o So here, Ellison is making a relationship between time and the lack of change that has
occurred in the life of the African American. Although they are now “free,” they are not
able to enjoy the freedoms that are associated to their white countrymen. Even later in
the text, we see white students being prepared for business, etc. while the black men
are prepared for jobs like mechanics, drivers, farmers. Jobs white men with money do
not wish to do and jobs former slaves were to undertake for their masters.

Resources

K r a s t e v a , Y o n k a . " C h o a s a n d P a tt e r n i n E l l i s o n ' s ' I n v i s i b l e M a n " . " S o u t h e r n

Literary Journal. 30.1 (1997): 55-72. Print.
K o s t e l a n e t z , R i c h a r d . " T h e P o l i ti c s o f E l l i s o n ' s B o o k e r : " I n v i s i b l e M a n " a s
Symbolic History ." Chicago Review. 19.2 (1967): 5-26. Print.

Samuels, Wilfred D. Ellison’s Invisible Man. Explicator. 1984-07. 42:4. 49(3).