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18. Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952)

  • Katharina Motyl

Abstract

In Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man, the nameless African American protagonist, who has sought refuge from white supremacist society in a basement, narrates his life story and the insights he has had in self-imposed exile. Throughout the story, in which he symbolically lives through African American history after emancipation from slavery, Invisible Man struggles to find his identity, as he is socially invisible to the white majority society and other characters fail to perceive his individuality. Rejecting various political ideologies with which he was at one point affiliated, especially communism and black accommodationism, Invisible Man finds his identity by narrating the multiple subject positions he occupies to the reader, hoping that the reader will afford him the recognition he is denied in the story world. The novel is written in a modernist style that draws on black expressive culture such as jazz and the blues.

Abstract

In Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man, the nameless African American protagonist, who has sought refuge from white supremacist society in a basement, narrates his life story and the insights he has had in self-imposed exile. Throughout the story, in which he symbolically lives through African American history after emancipation from slavery, Invisible Man struggles to find his identity, as he is socially invisible to the white majority society and other characters fail to perceive his individuality. Rejecting various political ideologies with which he was at one point affiliated, especially communism and black accommodationism, Invisible Man finds his identity by narrating the multiple subject positions he occupies to the reader, hoping that the reader will afford him the recognition he is denied in the story world. The novel is written in a modernist style that draws on black expressive culture such as jazz and the blues.

Heruntergeladen am 20.9.2025 von https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110422429-020/html
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