Ralph Ellison And Invisible Man

IntroductionRalph Ellison is an American novelist, essayist, short story writer, and critic. He is regarded as one of the most influential and accomplished contemporary American authors for his highly acclaimed novel Invisible Man(1952).This paper will deal with Ralph Ellison's masterpiece Invisible Man, mainly its themes, symbols and images, and what influences Ellison was under, namely, his "relatives and antecedents".Chapter One Themes of Invisible ManI. Invisible Man and its major themeInvisible Man is a story of an innocent black youth searching for his identity. As to the structure of this novel, Ellison himself regarded it as a three-part structure. Prologue and Epilogue each serves as one section and the main body another section which can be subdivided into three parts.The major theme of this story, according to existentialism, is to search for an individual's identity in an absurd society. The story begins with a striking sentence" I am an invisible man." This is also the conclusion of the protagonist about his life experience. It is his identity that he has been searching for in all his early ventures. Those ventures mainly include three parts-"college experience, life in New York andthe brotherhood". The invisibility is stressed in varied places as the story develops. 2. Minor themes of Invisible Man2.1 Black and white issueIt is undoubtedly that the American society has been a white-dominated one since its formation. This life experience of the narrator proves that the black people in American were often in a state of being exploited and oppressed, invisible to the society; their feeble voice was overwhelmed by the powerful main rhythm of the white.2.2 Women issueThe women characters in Invisible Man are often criticized as stereotyped. Its women characters generally fall into two groups on the basis of race, black ones and white ones.Some of the black women characters are mother figures, and others serve as sexual symbols. Their personalities, however, become invisible in these stereotyped functions. The white women characters are unexceptionally symbols of sex desire and the trophy of men's war in their strife upward. This reveals one blind spot of Mr. Ellison, and he is therefore criticized as sexism.Chapter Two Arts in Invisible Man1. Symbols and imagesOne of the secrets that Invisible Man is so impressive is its vivid symbols and images. The discussion here will mainly be about sight and color. 1.1 sightThe invisibility works not only as the main theme of the novel but also as the main image, as a see-without-seeing drunk white man in the prologue, and 1,396lights in the narrator's hibernating basement. There are many episodes concerning the image of blinding or blindness, such as blindfolded fighting in the battle royal, the bronze statue of the college Founder lifting a veil over the face of a kneeling slave, a blind speaker for the college founder, and Brother Jack, the one-eyed brotherhood leader.1.2 colorThere are many occurrences of white and black or white against black for instance, the white line dividing the highway, black dopes into white paint, a bath of whiteness.1.3 some other minor images and symbols.In the novel there are three informants, who gave the narrator warnings and suggestions: the grandfather, the vet in Golden Day and Peter Wheatstraw. The other two images are a bank shaped like a grinning black man with "FEED ME" across its chest and Clifton's doll.2. black culture2.1 Brer Bear and Brer RabbitBrer Bear and Brer Rabbit are household figures in black folk stories. Brer Rabbit often outwits his rivals with his wit while Brer Bear is often outwitted by Brer Rabbit. The narrator called himself Brer Bear, so there was Brer Rabbit who would teach him a lesson. These Rabbits include Mr. Bledsoe, the black president of the college, Kimbro and Brockway in the Liberty White Paint Plant, Brother Jack in the Brotherhood.2.2 bluesBlues words and rhymes resound throughout Invisible Man. The blues supplies bone and flesh for t...