Visibility? We'll see.
Visibility: the state of being able to see or be seen.
In the novel, there's an interesting dynamic between the narrator's visibility with himself and his visibility to others. It's almost a proportional relationship. As the narrator furthers his connections to the Brotherhood, he gains more exposure, and he is well-known to the general public. In this way, he's definitely visible to everyone else. However, as a result, the narrator loses the ability to see his own reality. He's so blinded by all the exciting opportunities from the Brotherhood that he can no longer see his genuine self, morals, and the truth behind the ongoing racial issues. He's caught up in their ideology, following their orders and words to say instead of his own. Even his natural thoughts and actions change to align with the Brotherhood. As a result, his unawareness of the Brotherhood's effects makes him invisible to, or unable to see, his own identity.
I feel like the narrator is almost at his peak of public visibility. The novel has to bring the visibility back down at some point, in order for the narrator to become the same person he was introduced as. In fact, the scene where he confronts the Brotherhood for not understanding the bigger issues is where I think he finds more visibility in himself. Arguing against Brother Jack and the others was a brave thing to do, and although they all shut him down, he gains a new sense of power within himself. Because of this scene, the Brotherhood views him as someone who should not be so visible to everyone. They shut him down repeatedly, telling him to stay in his place and just do as he is told.
I think the reader's point of view in this novel is particularly interesting because of our ability to see everything that happens to the narrator. Although, in a way, our visibility is limited to his ability to narrate his life and the events around him. While we can draw our own conclusions, there's always the question of if we can trust the narrator to accurately depict everything. We play an interesting role in the novel because the narrator seems to always be telling us a story as the novel progresses. I don't really have a point here, I think we should just keep in mind that we are being addressed throughout the novel as active readers.
Great post! I think the way we see the narrator's extreme public attention right now could also be taken as an escalation into his visibility. I'm thinking of the scene where he's blinded by the lights in the arena while giving a speech. Everyone knows him and his paying attention to him, but he feels like no one can see him. So, maybe his public presence eventually makes him feel like so much of a celebrity that he starts to feel alone and unheard.
ReplyDeleteI thought your point about how the narrator has to lose visibility was really interesting, and I also thought it was really interesting how Ellison chose to make him live in a dark hole for the rest of his life. There are so many ways to stay away from the public eye, and also to nurture more fulfilling and deep relationships, than to just completely become a recluse. I haven't quite figured out the point that Ellison is trying to make here.
ReplyDeleteI forget sometimes while reading that the narrator may not be completely reliable. He's recounting his life and his experiences with visibility not too long after these events happen. I wonder how the narrative would change if we were being told the story by an omnipotent narrator or an outside observer.
ReplyDeleteThat is such a good point! I do think it'd be interesting to see the story play out from any other characters perspective, since in so many books you see some speculation on the narrators part about everyone else's actions and thoughts, and yet in this novel other characters are kind of regarded as NPCs by the narrator
DeleteI really like your point, and I agree that the narrator has a very complicated relationship with the concept of visibility/invisibility. There are so many ways to interpret how he is seen, and perhaps through a white person's eyes, they may not even notice the narrator at his peak visibility. The entire concept of being seen by others and how he sees himself is something that I see the narrator struggle with.
ReplyDeleteIt's really fun to find this blog post now that the book is through and we've read how the narrator "boomeranged" back to a position of invisibility! I also like what Stefania mentioned about how the other characters in Invisible Man are treated kind of like NPCs, and I think it contrasts kind of brutally with the narrator's expectation for us as the audience to be present and engaged the whole way through. I guess it's true that the people in his life didn't choose to encounter him, whereas we literally have to have the book in front of our eyes to take in what he's describing, but I felt like there was some sort of double standard there.
ReplyDeleteThat is actually pretty interesting, because I think that only the narrator has this trait. The three other characters that are primarily described to have invisibility don't seem to follow this trend. We're not ever really sure what Bledso's visibility is like with himself, but it can be inferred that he might have a mastery of it just like how he has a mastery of his own invisibility. Brockway is both invisible and not visible to himself, since he doesn't see the oppression he faces. And Rinehart is not invisible to anyone, but seems to be visible to himself (of course this last one is unprovable, I'm basing this off of the idea that Rinehart is supposed to be an inverse version of the narrator to some extent). Overall, good post!
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