Invisible Man (Illustrated)

by Ralph Ellison

But to whom can I be responsible, and why should I be, when you refuse to see me?

Responsibility rests upon recognition, and recognition is a form of agreement.

Shouldn't he, for his own personal safety, have recognized my hysteria, my "danger potential"?

Live with your head in the lion's mouth. I want you to overcome 'em with yeses, undermine 'em with grins, agree 'em to death and destruction, let 'em swoller you till they vomit or bust wide open."

How had I come to this? I had kept unswervingly to the path placed before me, had tried to be exactly what I was expected to be, had done exactly what I was expected to do -- yet, instead of winning the expected reward, here I was stumbling along, holding on desperately to one of my eyes in order to keep from bursting out my brain against some familiar object swerved into my path by my distorted vision.

Play the game, but don't believe in it -- that much you owe yourself.

"I know how they do it, wherever they do it.

"I hope so," I said. "Don't hope, make it that way."

to hell with being ashamed of what you liked.

What and how much had I lost by trying to do only what was expected of me instead of what I myself had wished to do? What a waste, what a senseless waste!

not a pit to hiss in, nor a window to shout the news and us right with them. Look at them, not a shack to pray in or an alley to sing the blues!

and you'll have no tyrant