Identity In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

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The past few weeks we have reading Ralph Ellison’s novel, Invisible Man. In this novel a striking and horrific picture of what America was like back then and how society viewed and treated others. It was also very moving and an eye opener to show how this world basically tells how to view others and leaves many feeling “invisible”. The narrator was a black male who got kicked out of his university and moved to New York where he struggled to find work and also struggled to find himself. He went through many hardships and he was one of those who had that invisible feeling and struggled to find his own identity.

Society imposes an idea how blacks should behave and they only see him as they want to. This racial prejudice limits the narrator’s ability to act. While the narrator is trying to express himself and his thoughts with these expectations imposed on him he finds that his roles are limited and he basically has to act fake. Even his brothers who found him and encouraged him to speak …show more content…
As he writes his story he is constantly being told what to do or how to act and it makes him very confused of who he really is. With him being so young this isn’t very surprising that he has all of these struggles. I just think this shows the lack of compassion people had that they drove a young kid into a literal hole and left him feeling invisible. Despite everything he went through and his dark stage in life he still decided to rise above because others might be blind but he is not and he is not scared to say what he believes. People are literally so thoughtless they do not see the big picture and I believe blindness was the biggest issue in this novel. The lack of compassion has not changed since the era in which this novel has written, I believe still to this day people are just as ignorant and I highly respect people like the narrator who will fight for
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