Reviews

I know I am supposed to revel in classic texts, or whatever I'm supposed to do with them, but they're just not my favorite type of writing. I can see the beauty here, in the endless allegories, parallels, symbolism and stripping away of the narrator's world beliefs. It's just not my favorite type of read. Unsophisticated am I? Sure, perhaps. Or, just personal preference.

I picked this up because I learned that someone I'm working with once read it and found it moving. Most fascinating to me is the many parallels I was able to see between their life and the narrator's (we never do learn his name, right?). In fact it's almost eerie - though perhaps if you go in looking for coincidences, it no coincidence when you find them. From the perceived invisibility to the move north, the leaving school to head to the city, the disillusionment with force-as-entertainment and self-interest of those that claim to help, as well as the house fire, lunatics, death of loved ones, and more. Oof.

I think I would have enjoyed reading more in a group or a class to really dive into the various contours of the text. Alone, I'm somewhat helpless. But, alas.

baldwig's review against another edition

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reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison 1952 4

• "Responsibility rests upon recognition, and recognition is a form of agreement."
• "They were blind, bat blind, moving only by the echoed sounds of their own voices"

• moll- a gangster's girlfriend
moil- vb to work hard : drudge
• White dividing lines. Invisible blackness. Symbolism. 10 black drops disappearing into a gallon of white paint. Smothered/invisible in the vast whiteness.
• dissimulate- hide under a false appearance : dissemble
spat- a gaiter covering instep and ankle
• The invisible young man's naivite was frustrating but necessary. I too believed in people's good intent, took what they "told me as the honest-to-God truth." Rose-colored glasses distort white, black and all the grey areas in between.
• Ras the Exhorter, "Blood calls for blood!"
Stephen King referenced Invisible Man in Carrie.
• Micah Reads,:mistake leaving Harlem without saying he was reassigned, clarifying not leaving of his own volition, abandoning his brothers, sisters and cause, instead leaving Brother Wrestrom room to spin his own narrative.
• 'Black-face," a manipulated, misinformed mouthpiece for the 'Brotherhood.' BrotherJack (symbolic glass eye doesn't see the Invisible Man).
• Like with Tod Clifton, people will betray their own to 'better' themselves. Unfortunately, my family is filled with perfidious, aggressive anger and not so well-hidden hate.
• "What on earth was hiding behind the face of things?"
Rank strangers, even self?
• "And now all past humiliations became precious parts of my experience, and for the first time, leaning against that stone wall in the sweltering night, I began to accept my past and, as I accepted it, I felt memories welling up within me. It was as though I'd learned suddenly to look around corners; images of past humiliations flickered through my head and I saw that they were more than separate experiences. They were me; they defined me. I was my experiences and my experiences were me, and no blind men, no matter how powerful they became, even if they conquered the world, could take that, or change one single itch, taunt, laugh, cry, scar, ache, rage or pain of it. They were blind, bat blind, moving only by the echoed sounds of their own voices. And because they were blind they would destroy themselves and I'd help them. I laughed. Here I had thought they accepted me because they felt that color made no difference, when in reality it made no difference because they didn't see either color or men . . . For all they were concerned, we were so many names scribbled on fake ballots, to be used at their convenience and when not needed to be filed away. It was a joke, an absurd joke. And now I looked around a corner of my mind..."
• Youthful illusion into independence in invisibility.
• "If only we had some true friends, some who saw us as more than convenient tools for shaping their own desires!"
• serge- twilled woolen cloth
• "". . . What do they plan for me, Sybil?" "Who, boo'ful?""
Boo, a spook reference? Casper the Friendly (Invisible) Ghost. So much symbolism. El Toro Black Bull, beautiful black buck brute. To be seen (not heard) and not seen. Seeing eye service dogs. The invisible guiding the blind. This novel demands and deserves rereading.

racheltanza's review against another edition

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5.0

"'Ah,' I can hear you say, 'so it was all a build-up to bore us with his buggy jiving. He only wanted us to listen to him rave!' But only partially true: Being invisible and without substance, a disembodied voice, as it were, what else could I do? What else but try to tell you what was really happening when your eyes were looking through? And it is this which frightens me: Who knows but that, on the lower frequencies, I speak for you?"

Man, what a good book.

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