Existential Vision in Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man"

 

Ralph Ellison's novel Invisible Man can be studied as an existential one, for it deals directly with the questions of individual existence, identity formation, and the meaning of life for a black man confronted with racism and cultural stereotypes. In a paramount existential scene in a factory hospital, the Invisible Man twice asks himself: “Who am I?”

The young protagonist is a nameless man seeking an identity and recognition in a hostile world and constantly questioning his existence. The Invisible Man arrives at the realization that he himself is the source of meaning and morality in an existential life. Instead of looking for these outwards, he learns to turn inwards to find them. The Invisible Man says: “I was naïve. I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which I, and only I, could answer. It took me a long time and much painful boomeranging of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: That I am nobody but myself. But first I had to discover that I am an invisible man!” Trueblood similarly learns the important existential lesson conveyed by the blues that the solution is to be found in the self, not in others.



The prologue of the novel highlights invisibility—as an existential condition—and psychological mirroring. The novel begins with the Invisible Man’s assertion that he is invisible and that others, when looking at him, see his “surroundings, themselves… everything and anything except [him]”. Right from the start, the Invisible Man establishes the refusal of others to see him.

Living alone in an underground hole means that the narrator is alienated and dehumanized. Like the existential characters of Kafka and Camus, he lives in an oppressive, indifferent society. He learns now that one defines life and gives it meaning/ essence in existentialism, in first existing and then asserting one’s values. Thus, the Nietzschean existential “overman” is one who creates morality and gives meaning to experience. Besides, falling into a manhole, as befalls the Invisible Man, is a clear metaphor for the existential abyss.



Seen from an existential perspective, the sequence of the novel’s events is absurd. Absurdity and meaninglessness are basic existential tenets. The events are absurd in that the narrator has no control over the unfolding story. They seem surreal sometimes as when the narrator suddenly falls into a manhole or when Ras appears on a big black horse and in Abyssinian chieftain dress. Ras the Destroyer carries a shield and wears a fur cap and a cape made of animal skin in the manner of a medieval knight, just as more of a man in a dream than in reality. 

The Harlem riot scene at the end of the book captures dream logic with laughter, sirens, gunshots, running looters, and people burning their apartment building, all making it an absurd night. The haunting presence of the Invisible Man’s dead grandfather, along with his eerie laughter, is also surreal. Ellison’s employment of surreal or absurd elements in the plot enhances the existential import of the novel.


Read more about the novel:

Plot Outline/ Summary

Major Characters

Brother Jack

Themes

The Battle Royal Scene

The Golden Day Episode

The Liberty Paints Episode

As a Bildungsroman

The Prologue and the Epilogue

Narrative Technique

Parody

Symbolism

Metaphor

Satire

Irony

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