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sidharthvardhan's review against another edition
5.0
Stereotypes
All the world is stage and we are merely playing our roles in here; these are not the roles we choose to play, we are struck into them by default, just as we are struck in our skins. And as long as we are seen by others, we can't free ourselves of these roles (created by stereotypes of other). We do not even we know about what we truly are - and as long as that is true we are slaves to those prejudices:
"When I discover who I'm, I'll be free.
Racism
However, other form of stereotypes too find their way into book; racism is most obvious - we are introduced from whitening skin creams to American 'Liberty' color plant which takes pride in its white paints to the coin-bank dolls as smiling black slaves. The chapters set in south showcases through some hair-raising examples. Battle Roayale seems to symbolism the internal competition among black (or 'deprived' in general) for limited opportunities thrown at them. Those who do make it - Dr. Bledsoe; may not be afraid of turning against their own people to hold on to their position.
If white are oppressing black, than there is obvious prejudice but even if white are trying to patch things up - if a white woman won't ask narrator to sing thinking that it can be offensive to blacks; prejudice is still there since she is still thinking of him as a black person. Jim's incest which invites disgust from his whole community and should have attracted disgust from white people too; rather attracts their pity simply because he is black.
And black are not themselves free of stereotypes - through out the novel different people including black people themselves have different ideas as to ideal way for a black person to live. Narrator's grand-father thinks the best way for a black person to live is by always agreeing to whatever white say. Ras the Exhorter wants black people to get together against white people. Even the innocent Mary thinks that narrator should bring prestige and equality to his race by getting a job.
The lesson is clear, you can't fight stereotypes with stereotypes (which puts in my mind, Indian habit of making reservation quotas for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes)
Blindness
And this is narrator's problem - he thinks himself as a more complex being than as just a black man or (when in north) as a black man from south or (when around woman) as a man. He wants to free himself of these illusions.
He joins a brotherhood where all people are supposed to be equal but as soon as there is a fight he is reminded of his skin color. Even the brotherhood, narrator learns, doesn't 'see' him as a complex person - in fact it seems to turn him to be uni-dimensional. The ideologies and political movements have their limits - it is not enough to treat everyone has equal but people should really think and feel as equals.
The whole society is blind (which became figurative in Jack's lost eye) - in as far as no one can see his true self and only see their own idea of him.
Invisibility
And since no one can see him, he is invisible:
"I'm invisible to see me .... when they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves or figments of their imagination - indeed everything except me."
Society only sees him through clothes of identity it gives him - his name (the one given to him on baptism and one given to him by brotherhood); his skin color; his place of birth, his clothes. He puts on a new hat and changes shoes - and bang he is seen as someone else. Take away those identities and he is invisible. It is in struggling with this invisibility that narrator writes the book; and somewhere along he does find a way out of this identity crisis.
Elison's Genuis
It is best use of first person narration that I've come across. Elison combines Woolf's stream- of-consciousness-thing; Sartre's existentialism and American stereotypes in a single book. At first it just seemed a collection of unrelated events but Mr. Invisible's habit of breaking into interior monologues and debates every now and than builds a long chain of reasoning right through the whole book - from his learning of how stereotypes work to his understanding blindness of people (their inability to see him) to his discovery of his invisibility and its powers. If only I could understand his symbolism better!
All the world is stage and we are merely playing our roles in here; these are not the roles we choose to play, we are struck into them by default, just as we are struck in our skins. And as long as we are seen by others, we can't free ourselves of these roles (created by stereotypes of other). We do not even we know about what we truly are - and as long as that is true we are slaves to those prejudices:
"When I discover who I'm, I'll be free.
Racism
However, other form of stereotypes too find their way into book; racism is most obvious - we are introduced from whitening skin creams to American 'Liberty' color plant which takes pride in its white paints to the coin-bank dolls as smiling black slaves. The chapters set in south showcases through some hair-raising examples. Battle Roayale seems to symbolism the internal competition among black (or 'deprived' in general) for limited opportunities thrown at them. Those who do make it - Dr. Bledsoe; may not be afraid of turning against their own people to hold on to their position.
If white are oppressing black, than there is obvious prejudice but even if white are trying to patch things up - if a white woman won't ask narrator to sing thinking that it can be offensive to blacks; prejudice is still there since she is still thinking of him as a black person. Jim's incest which invites disgust from his whole community and should have attracted disgust from white people too; rather attracts their pity simply because he is black.
And black are not themselves free of stereotypes - through out the novel different people including black people themselves have different ideas as to ideal way for a black person to live. Narrator's grand-father thinks the best way for a black person to live is by always agreeing to whatever white say. Ras the Exhorter wants black people to get together against white people. Even the innocent Mary thinks that narrator should bring prestige and equality to his race by getting a job.
The lesson is clear, you can't fight stereotypes with stereotypes (which puts in my mind, Indian habit of making reservation quotas for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes)
Blindness
And this is narrator's problem - he thinks himself as a more complex being than as just a black man or (when in north) as a black man from south or (when around woman) as a man. He wants to free himself of these illusions.
He joins a brotherhood where all people are supposed to be equal but as soon as there is a fight he is reminded of his skin color. Even the brotherhood, narrator learns, doesn't 'see' him as a complex person - in fact it seems to turn him to be uni-dimensional. The ideologies and political movements have their limits - it is not enough to treat everyone has equal but people should really think and feel as equals.
The whole society is blind (which became figurative in Jack's lost eye) - in as far as no one can see his true self and only see their own idea of him.
Invisibility
And since no one can see him, he is invisible:
"I'm invisible to see me .... when they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves or figments of their imagination - indeed everything except me."
Society only sees him through clothes of identity it gives him - his name (the one given to him on baptism and one given to him by brotherhood); his skin color; his place of birth, his clothes. He puts on a new hat and changes shoes - and bang he is seen as someone else. Take away those identities and he is invisible. It is in struggling with this invisibility that narrator writes the book; and somewhere along he does find a way out of this identity crisis.
Elison's Genuis
It is best use of first person narration that I've come across. Elison combines Woolf's stream- of-consciousness-thing; Sartre's existentialism and American stereotypes in a single book. At first it just seemed a collection of unrelated events but Mr. Invisible's habit of breaking into interior monologues and debates every now and than builds a long chain of reasoning right through the whole book - from his learning of how stereotypes work to his understanding blindness of people (their inability to see him) to his discovery of his invisibility and its powers. If only I could understand his symbolism better!
elmerelvis's review against another edition
It was just too much. All of the literally imagery just didnt make sense to me.
tessasap's review against another edition
reflective
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
house3000's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
outcolder's review against another edition
5.0
Misadventures that I found shocking and brutal were probably hilariously funny stories to Ralph Ellison and his friends. I think I will read some lit-crit about this to find out what people think it all means.
thechanelmuse's review against another edition
5.0
Vision versus blindness. Social conditioning. Ideologies. The nature of self-interested power. Power structures. Stereotypes. Idolization. "Playing the game."
This masterful debut novel by Ralph Ellison is layered with themes, symbols and motifs (the briefcase, the Liberty Paints factory, and the sambo figures to name a few) that are used to reflect the shaping of the nameless narrator's ethnic and cultural identity on the heels of self-discovery and maintaining/shifting power in various ways. Ellison bodied this.
This masterful debut novel by Ralph Ellison is layered with themes, symbols and motifs (the briefcase, the Liberty Paints factory, and the sambo figures to name a few) that are used to reflect the shaping of the nameless narrator's ethnic and cultural identity on the heels of self-discovery and maintaining/shifting power in various ways. Ellison bodied this.
gadicohen93's review against another edition
2.0
rubbish. intolerably long. protagonist that lacked a shred of cleverness—naive to an absurd degree. long-winded writing with some good passages. but the length! oh, the length! barf.
lolitzharms's review against another edition
4.0
Great telling on the struggles of black people throughout the book, using stereotypes and many literary devices to portray the narrative. The separation between life in the South and the North, the internal thoughts, everything was great. However, it dragged on a lot for me, took a lot of energy to get through Ellison's extensive diction and imagery.
Rating: 4 ⭐ :)
Rating: 4 ⭐ :)