false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255763439m/16981.jpg 16981 41 We rely, in this world, on the visual aspects of humanity as a means of learning who we are. This, Ralph Ellison argues convincingly, is a dangerous habit. A classic from the moment it first appeared in 1952, <I>Invisible Man</I> chronicles the travels of its narrator, a young, nameless black man, as he moves through the hellish levels of American intolerance and cultural blindness. Searching for a context in which to know himself, he exists in a very peculiar state. "I am an invisible man," he says in his prologue. "When they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves, or figments of their imagination--indeed, everything and anything except me." But this is hard-won self-knowledge, earned over the course of many years.<br><br> As the book gets started, the narrator is expelled from his Southern Negro college for inadvertently showing a white trustee the reality of black life in the south, including an incestuous farmer and a rural whorehouse. The college director chastises him: "Why, the dumbest black bastard in the cotton patch knows that the only way to please a white man is to tell him a lie! What kind of an education are you getting around here?" Mystified, the narrator moves north to New York City, where the truth, at least as he perceives it, is dealt another blow when he learns that his former headmaster's recommendation letters are, in fact, letters of condemnation.<br><br> What ensues is a search for what truth actually is, which proves to be supremely elusive. The narrator becomes a spokesman for a mixed-race band of social activists called "The Brotherhood" and believes he is fighting for equality. Once again, he realizes he's been duped into believing what he thought was the truth, when in fact it is only another variation. Of the Brothers, he eventually discerns: "They were blind, bat blind, moving only by the echoed sounds of their voices. And because they were blind they would destroy themselves.... Here I 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."<br><br> <I>Invisible Man</I> is certainly a book about race in America, and sadly enough, few of the problems it chronicles have disappeared even now. But Ellison's first novel transcends such a narrow definition. It's also a book about the human race stumbling down the path to identity, challenged and successful to varying degrees. None of us can ever be sure of the truth beyond ourselves, and possibly not even there. The world is a tricky place, and no one knows this better than the invisible man, who leaves us with these chilling, provocative words: "And it is this which frightens me: Who knows but that, on the lower frequencies, I speak for you?" <I>--Melanie Rehak</I> 170957 book 1952 Invisible Man total:17206|5:6213|4:5879|3:3536|2:1156|1:422| 17206 67923 23135 1089 2 11 false false Mon Feb 16 13:44:32 -0800 2009 Mon Feb 16 13:52:06 -0800 2009 more...]]> 2 6 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Tue Dec 04 14:46:48 -0800 2007 Fri Jan 25 15:24:26 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 4 false false Tue Jan 27 09:58:50 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 27 10:25:13 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 4 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Jul 01 22:27:42 -0700 2007 Mon Sep 03 19:19:41 -0700 2007 Invisible Man is still as powerful and elegant now as it was when I first read it in school. I understand it better now that I am a bit more mature. I understand it better reading as an outsider looking back on my homeland. I understand it better as a member of the minority in my chosen home. I...more...]]> 4 3 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Tue Jan 08 03:59:37 -0800 2008 Thu Jan 24 07:14:15 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 11 false false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 1979 Wed Mar 19 17:25:44 -0700 2008 Wed Mar 19 17:32:12 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 3 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2002 Mon Jul 30 15:14:33 -0700 2007 Wed Aug 15 19:22:31 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 4 false false Thu May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Thu May 01 23:30:40 -0700 2008 Mon May 19 20:47:43 -0700 2008 Toni Morrison, assuredly would also receive votes). The irony being a result of Ellison using key ev...more...]]> 5 1 false false Thu Jul 31 22:20:40 -0700 2008 Sat Aug 02 07:30:57 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Fri Jun 20 15:33:14 -0700 2008 Sun Jun 22 19:22:32 -0700 2008 more...]]> 3 1 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Oct 04 18:22:55 -0700 2007 Thu Oct 04 18:32:09 -0700 2007
I almost regret taking the job driving Mr. Norton. even thought the job does come with a good pay (especially since Mr. Norton is a millionaire); I made a mistake of showing him the cabins where the slaves live and I mentioned Jim Trueblood. I was just trying to show him th...more...]]> 3 1 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 27 09:05:58 -0700 2007 Mon Sep 03 08:14:04 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Jun 26 15:18:25 -0700 2007 Tue Jun 26 15:32:12 -0700 2007 more...]]> 3 1 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2001 Mon Dec 29 17:42:37 -0800 2008 Mon Dec 29 17:46:40 -0800 2008 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2003 Fri Jun 15 05:09:25 -0700 2007 Fri Jun 15 05:15:11 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 2 false false Sun Mar 08 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sun Mar 08 21:29:03 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 09 01:00:33 -0700 2009
This novel is just as trenchantly relevant today as it was in Ellison’s time, for the politics of identity is just as much, if not more, as potent an issue today as it was then. Muslim, fundamentalist, gay, red, blue … The labels of tod...more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Jan 19 15:41:20 -0800 2009 Mon Jan 19 15:42:21 -0800 2009 more...]]> 0 0 false false Mon Dec 01 15:07:17 -0800 2008 Mon Dec 01 15:48:28 -0800 2008 more...]]> 2 0 false true Fri Nov 14 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 22 05:53:50 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 22 05:54:35 -0800 2008 1
“I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who hanted Edgar Allan Poe; not am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, ...more...]]> 3 0 false false Tue Nov 17 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Nov 17 10:01:27 -0800 2009 Tue Nov 17 10:01:59 -0800 2009 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=16981