The Liberty Paints episode in Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man"

 

The Invisible Man arrives in Harlem, carrying seven letters of recommendation from the founding fathers and friends of the school, which might help him obtain work. Overwhelmed by the city, Invisible Man attempts to enter the workforce in Harlem, not desperate for a meaningful career but just any kind of work that will earn him enough to live off. It is soon apparent, however, that his seven letters of recommendation from Dr Bledsloe actually portray him as a dishonourable character. He eventually finds work in a paint factory called ‘Liberty Paints’, which prides itself on producing a particular shade of colour called ‘Optic White’, used on several significant national monuments, into which they disperse several drops of black paint. Lucas E. Morel calls this chiaroscurist metaphor Ellison’s ‘test of the American melting pot’, raising an awareness of what the author designed as the ‘inclusion and not assimilation of the black man’.



After an explosion at the factory, the concept of Invisible Man’s awareness is complicated as the narrator wakes in a factory hospital mute, and with temporary amnesia. In his vulnerable state, he is cruelly experimented upon by several perverse physicians; he is hooked up to a machine that, the doctors laughingly suggest, ‘will produce the results of a prefrontal lobotomy without the negative effects of the knife’. 55 They believe, as he is an unidentified African American male, he must be a criminal whose personality they can remould through the wonder of medical science.

The existential dilemmas of the typical coming-of-age genre are playfully literalised as the doctors eventually try to identify their patient. They hold up cards asking questions such as, ‘WHAT IS YOUR NAME?’,‘WHO… ARE… YOU?’, and ‘WHO WAS BUCKEYE THE RABBIT?’ in reference to a popular children’s song. 56 Invisible Man is left alone on his hospital bed, trapped in a daze and, ‘fretting over [his] identity’. He suspects that he ‘was really playing a game with myself and that they were taking part. A kind of combat’. 57 In a biblical allusion to the Book of Judges, Invisible Man compares himself to Samson, the betrayed and blinded Israelite with superhuman strength, who murders thousands of Philistines for their part in his imprisonment and degradation, killing himself in the same act of terrorism.

“I had no desire to destroy myself even if it destroyed the machine; I wanted freedom, not destruction. It was exhausting, for no matter what the scheme I conceived, there was one constant flaw – myself. There was no getting around it. I could not more escape than I could think of my identity. Perhaps, I thought, the two things are involved with each other. When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.”



The ‘machine’ in this instance is both literal and metaphorical; it could easily be read as referring to the mechanisms of bigotry. His short-term quest for identity is fruitless because he has not yet reached his defining moment as an individual. The use of imagery turns this life event into an allegorical sideshow in terms of narrative progression. A nurse announces that he is a ‘new man’; the doctor who discharges him tells him ‘I have [your name] here’, but never divulges it to the narrator. 59 He returns to the outside world no closer to understanding who he is or what his role or identity may be, only that he may not return to the industrial workforce due to health limitations. Before leaving the hospital, the ‘doctor’ is revealed to be a factory official who is determined to renege Invisible Man’s compensation rights as an injured worker: ‘But, after all, any new occupation has its hazards. They are part of growing up, of becoming adjusted, as it were. One takes a chance and while some are prepared, others are not’, 60 The doctor’s dismissive speech reminds Invisible Man of Mr. Norton and Dr. Bledsoe, who were also quick to relieve themselves of any social responsibility toward him.


Read more about the novel:

Plot Outline/ Summary

Major Characters

Brother Jack

Themes

The Battle Royal Scene

The Golden Day Episode

As a Bildungsroman

Existential Vision

The Prologue and the Epilogue

Narrative Technique

Parody

Symbolism

Metaphor

Satire

Irony

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