Invisible Man

by Ralph Ellison

This reality made for an existential torture, which was given a further twist of the screw by his awareness that once the peace was signed, the German camp commander could immigrate to the United States and immediately take advantage of freedoms that were denied the most heroic of Negro servicemen. Thus democratic ideals and military valor alike were rendered absurd by the prevailing mystique of race and color.

I had no idea as to why it should surface, but perhaps it was to remind me that since I was writing fiction and seeking vaguely for images of black and white fraternity I would do well to recall that Henry James’s brother Wilky had fought as an officer with those Negro soldiers, and that Colonel Shaw’s body had been thrown into a ditch with those of his men. Perhaps it was also to remind me that war could, with art, be transformed into something deeper and more meaningful than its surface violence …

I am not ashamed of my grandparents for having been slaves. I am only ashamed of myself for having at one time been ashamed.

After all, there was antagonism to our being employed. Maybe he was dissimulating, like some of the teachers at the college, who, to avoid trouble when driving through the small surrounding towns, wore chauffeur caps and pretended that their cars belonged to white men. But why was he pretending with me? And what was his job?

Why, goddamit, why did they insist upon confusing the class struggle with the ass struggle, debasing both us and them—all human motives?

But this cop had an itching finger and an eager ear for a word that rhymed with ‘trigger,’ and when Clifton fell he had found it.