Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison | Summary & Analysis

[Music] let's summarize the plot of Invisible Man during the introduction of the novel the narrator explains his figurative invisibility stems from his not being seen as a free-thinking individual but through racial expectations of him from others the narrator lives hidden in a hole and recalls his grandfather's cryptic haunting advice about living as a black man during the rising action the bright young narrator is conned into participating in a bloody battle royal with other black students to amuse powerful community whites but is rewarded with a scholarship to a prestigious black college in his junior year the narrator's chauffeur is wealthy trustee mr. Norton and ends up exposed to a disturbing incestuous black sharecropper and a brothel full of mentally disturbed drunk War veterans expelled from school by the treacherous president dr. Bledsoe the narrator gets a job at Liberty paints a factory that produces optic white paint for the government he finds himself working alongside lucius Brockway a crotchety older black man who ends up attacking him the narrator is injured in a factory blast and sent to the factory hospital when the doctors administer unnecessary shock treatments that erases memory the narrator is released recovering at the home of a compassionate black woman Mary Rambo soon the narrator rediscovers his passion for public speaking and joins the Brotherhood a mysterious organization created to protect the socially oppressed in various communities after being indoctrinated by the Brotherhood the narrator Rises into becoming a leader of the organization's Harlem division but he encounters trouble in the form of Ross the exhorter a black nationalist who feuds with the Brotherhood seeing blacks as puppets for the white members agendas the Brotherhood turns on the narrator and reassigns him to the women's division downtown but he returns to Harlem because the Brotherhood is floundering in the community and Brotherhood colleague brother Todd Clifton is missing during the shocking climax of Invisible Man the narrator discovers Clifton selling racist dots the police arrive an officer shoot and kill Clifton right there in the street ignored by the Brotherhood the narrator arranges Clifton's funeral on his own and gives a fiery speech rendering Clifton visible in canonizing him as an individual during the falling action the narrator grows disillusioned with the brotherhood and their ideals and determined to destroy the organization from the inside the narrator seeks information he can use against them he unwittingly plays right into the Brotherhood's plans to turn power over to the violent Ross the exhorter Lee who incites brutal race riots all across Harlem this way the Brotherhood can destroy the black community by leading the community to destroy itself as the narrator rushes to Harlem he's confronted by Ross who demands that the traitor be lynched racing through the erupting violence the narrator leaps into an uncovered manhole and during the resolution the narrator hibernates underground but confesses that it's time for him to rejoin the surface world again let's review the central characters an Invisible Man first there's the narrator the unnamed narrator is a young light-skinned black man who becomes disillusioned in his journey to create a unique identity for himself within a racist society filled with racial expectations he feels invisible because everyone sees him based on their expectations of black men not as the unique individual he desires to be he fulfills his grandfather's ominous prediction that he will act treacherously against his people by inadvertently selling out the black residents of Harlem at the novel's end the hibernating narrator is redemptive Lee ready to return to society emerging with a truer identity doctor Bledsoe is the president of the college the narrator attends and the narrator idolizes everything about him the narrator blindly follows Bledsoe his philosophy that white is right hoping that it will earn him the same prestige but when the narrator is expelled from school he learns that the sinister dr. Bledsoe act only subservient to whites because doing so affords him a position of power mr. Norton is a wealthy white trustee who spent his life making large donations to the black college the narrator attends mr. Norton is really only interested in creating a philanthropic legacy that suggests he is concerned with racial equality but doesn't care about the real struggles of black individuals Jim Trueblood represents the black savage stereotype of the uneducated southern black man true blood gained infamy in the narrator's college town for his incestuous relationship with his daughter whom he impregnated while he was having a dream although ignorant true blood has learned to exploit his story to his family's financial advantage Mary Rambo represents the strength of the black community after being released from the factory hospital Mary takes the narrator in beads him and offers him a room when the narrator can no longer pay rent Mary allows him to stay for free hoping that he'll become a strong leader in the black community although the narrator is grateful for Mary's generosity he resents her expectations of him Ross the exhorter who later becomes Ross the destroyer is a violent black separatist which means he believes black Americans should start a society completely separate from white Americans he preaches for all black people to quit working for white bosses and to refuse to shop at white owned stores or even hold civil conversations with white people later Ross calls for the narrator's lynching brother Jack is the white leader of the Brotherhood in Harlem although the Brotherhood is formed to improve the lives of black Americans in reality it's a corrupt system exploited by brother Jack and his cohorts at first brother Jack seems heroic giving the narrator a respectable job and wage the brother Jack is using the narrator as a tool to advance his own motives he has no real desire to improve the life of Harlem residents abandoning them at the end of the novel let's talk about some of the key symbols in Invisible Man first there's Liberty paints the Liberty paints factory functions as an extended metaphor for race relations and expectations the most popular paint produced at the factory is optic white this paint symbolically covers blackness in the same way that the narrator's education sought to hide his black heritage or cultural blackness the finished paint is even called a graduate the fact that the paint is being sent to a National Monument evokes a larger theme of whitewashing national history by failing to acknowledge black contributions this idea is reinforced by the details of Lucius Brock ways contributions to the optic white paint he seemingly created the formula and masterminds daily production yet he receives no credit for his work from his white bosses who profit from his knowledge and labor this also symbolizes how black people can undermine each other serving white goals the Dahl is another crucial symbol Clifton's dancing dolls are cheap racist images used to entertain white audiences for a quick profit is the name of a stereotype of a subservient lazy slave happy to serve his master Clifton reinforces this stereotype by putting the dolls on strings like marionettes highlighting their inability to think or move on their own this is symbolic of Clifton and the narrator's roles as black men in the Brotherhood readers are never fully clear why Clifton turned to selling the dolls but the narrator believes that Clifton realized that he had become a dancing for the organization Mary's Bank is another important symbol first its grinning like coin gobbling appearance symbolizes the narrator's identity when he joins the Brotherhood he agrees to do a white man's bidding without question making himself a slave to the organization which has hired him to act not to think the narrator performs for money like the bank which flips coins into its mouth when the narrator shatters the bank and is unable to discard the pieces it's like the briefcase the chain and the doll represent the baggage of slavery the inescapable stereotypes black people face the narrator cannot abandon the discarded pieces he carries despite his best efforts to create a new identity for himself vision is a final major symbol characters vision issues are symbolic of their varying in abilities to recognize the narrator's struggles to identify himself some characters are described as being fully or half blond characters who offer the narrator some support or who recognize aspects of the struggle wear glasses which suggests their impaired vision of the truth those who see the world and race relations clearly for better or worse do not wear glasses let's review the central characters an Invisible Man first there's the narrator the unnamed narrator is a young light-skinned black man who becomes disillusioned in his journey to create a unique identity for himself within a racist society filled with racial expectations he feels invisible because everyone sees him based on their expectations of black men not as the unique individual he desires to be he fulfills his grandfather's ominous prediction that he will act treacherously against his people by inadvertently selling out the black residents of Harlem at the novel's end the hibernating narrator is redemptive Lee ready to return to society emerging with a truer identity dr. Bledsoe is the president of the College the narrator attends and the narrator idolizes everything about him the narrator blindly follows Bledsoe's philosophy that white is right hoping that it will earn him the same prestige but when the narrator is expelled from school he learns that the sinister dr. Bledsoe acts only subservient to White's because doing so affords him a position of power mr. Norton is a wealthy white trustee who spent his life making large donations to the black college the narrator attends mr. Norton is really only interested in creating a philanthropic legacy that suggests he is concerned with racial equality but doesn't care about the real struggles of black individuals Jim Trueblood represents the black savage stereotype of the uneducated southern black man true blood gained infamy in the narrator's college town for his incestuous relationship with his daughter whom he impregnated while he was having a dream although ignorant Trueblood has learned to exploit his story to his family's financial advantage Mary Rambo represents the strength of the black community after being released from the factory hospital Mary takes the narrator in beads him and offers him a room when the narrator can no longer pay rent Mary allows him to stay for free hoping that he'll become a strong leader in the black community although the narrator is grateful for Mary's generosity he resents her expectations of him raus the exhorter who later becomes Rast the destroyer is a violent black separatist which means he believes black Americans should start a society completely separate from white Americans he preaches for all black people to quit working for white bosses and to refuse to shop at white owned stores or even hold civil conversations with white people later Ross calls for the narrator's lynching brother Jack is the white leader of the Brotherhood in Harlem although the Brotherhood is formed to improve the lives of black Americans in reality it's a corrupt system exploited by brother Jack and his cohorts at first brother Jack seems heroic giving the narrator a respectable job and wage the brother Jack is using the narrator as a tool to advance his own motives he has no real desire to improve the life of Harlem residents abandoning them at the end of the novel [Music] you

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Keywords: invisible man (book), ralph ellison (author), important African-American novels, black history, Ellison, civil and political rights (literature subject), literature, summaries of books, book review

Id: VQJMYtet-ME

Length: 12min 15sec (735 seconds)

Published: Thu May 23 2019