Narrator A Job At Liberty Paints example essay topic

I was told to trace the metaphors of blindness in the novel Invisible Man by explaining the plot and thematic significance. There are many metaphors of blindness in this book starting from the Prologue to the Epilogue. I believe that Ralph Ellison was using these metaphors of blindness to show us how puzzled this young man was and how it affected him throughout his life. In the Prologue, the narrator starts off by telling us that he is physically visible but he is invisible to his peers or society because he is black. He also tells us that his invisibility can be an advantage or disadvantage. Being invisible to society sometimes makes him think that he really is invisible.

An advantage of being invisible is that he can use things and do things without people knowing the source. The narrator also shows us some invisibility by not telling us his name, I think this was very clever of the author to not revealing the name of the narrator; it kept the readers unsure of what it was. Many people have just given the narrator a name such as TIM (The Invisible Man) or I-Man just to give the narrator some type of identity. By being invisible, the narrator can also steal electricity from a power company, this allows him to have a presence but not be identified by the company. In the Prologue, the narrator listens especially to Louis Armstrong's "What Did I Do to Be So Black and Blue". This song relates directly to Invisible Man on a thematic level, as it shows one of jazz's earliest ways to make an open view on the issue of racism.

In chapter 1, the narrator is also blinded when he has to fight in the battle royal just to read his speech to white lawyers. The boys in the ring are all blindfolded to where they can't see. They are instructed to fight each other and whoever wins will get extra money. The blindfolds also represent the boys' own metaphorical blindness, they could not see that they were not just fighting for money; they were apart of entertainment to the white people.

The narrator is blind in so many ways that he has not learned to see behind the mask or the real side of people. In chapter 2, Mr. Norton shows a metaphor of blindness when he pretends likes he wants to help black college students when he is only doing it to make himself look good to other people. Mr. Norton's influence over the lives of the black students is still wrong; he uses mental power over them to make it seem like he is building up their confidence. This is another way of invisibility and blindness. Norton uses his power invisibly, without appearing to be controlling to others. In chapter 3, the narrator takes Mr. Norton to The Golden Day, it is an after hour hangout.

Mr. Norton passes out and one of the veterans takes him up stairs to see if he is okay. When the narrator awakes, the vet who claims to be a doctor and a graduate of the college tells the narrator he is only used as a mark on his scorecard of achievement rather than as a man and that the narrator thinks of Norton not as a man but as a god. He calls the narrator a machine suffering with a blindness that makes him do Norton's command and claims that this blindness is the narrator's problem. In chapter six, the author introduces another metaphor of blindness Reverend Barbee.

He is a blind man. In this chapter he tells a story of the Founder's physical weakness emphasizes the worthlessness that arises from a plan of blind faith. In this story he tells of how people are blind, not physically blind but spiritually blind. Reverend Barbee speaks about the Founder and the dream of the college in such a moving manner that the narrator feels numb and more in love with the college and what it stands for than ever before. Chapter 10 shows another illustration of blindness. The quote spoken by Brockway "Our white is so white you can paint a chunk a coal and you'd have to crack it open with a sledge hammer to prove it wasn't white clear through".

This quote here has a deeper meaning. When Brockway bragged about how one would have to crack open a chunk of coal painted with Liberty Paints' Optic White in order to determine its black core, the author illustrates how blackness becomes invisible under whiteness at the plant. This quote is also true because you would have to go down to the basement to see that the blacks were the ones who were making the white paint. In chapter 18, the narrator receives an anonymous, unstamped letter telling him not to "go too fast" and to remember that he is still a black man in a white world. The narrator is blinded with this letter because he does not know who sent this letter and why they would do something like this. The narrator was also blinded by his fame and did not realize how it affected everyone else in the Brotherhood.

While the narrator was gaining individual fame, the Brotherhood felt as if he not representing them anymore. In chapter 19, Hubert's wife briefly blinds the narrator. She used the narrator for her own pleasure by having sexual intercourse with him. The narrator did not see what the lady was doing, he did not know how to react; he did not know whether to hit her or have sexual intercourse with the lady. In chapter 20, the narrator sees the true side of the Brotherhood when he tries to have a conversation with former members. When he attempts to have a conversation, he basically ignores him.

The narrator did not see that they did not want him to be apart of the Brotherhood, he was too blinded by the attention that he could not realize that. He had been left out of meetings and looked over by the members. The Brotherhood basically used people for their own pleasure or promotion; that is exactly what they did to the narrator. Throughout this novel, the narrator has been blinded.

Mr. Norton blinded the narrator in the beginning of the book. Mr. Norton told the narrator how it was his destiny to help the narrator, when the only reason why he was doing this was only to make him look good. Dr. Bledsoe also blinded the narrator, he sends the narrator up north ensuring him that he will have a job and he will return to school in the fall. Dr. Bledsoe sends some letters with the narrator to give to Mr. Emerson's son who lets the narrator reads the letter and sees how Dr. Bledsoe has betrayed him. Mr. Emerson's son still gets the narrator a job at Liberty Paints even though Dr. Bledsoe tells him not to. Once the narrator agrees to join the Brotherhood, Brother Jack brings him into his world, giving him a new place to live, a new name, and a job to motivate and show the way to the people of Harlem through the teaching of the Brotherhood.

People are in addition blinded to Brother Jack's glass eye. This is another example of blindness because people do not know that his eye is not real, so they are fooled by it until one day Brother Jack's eye falls out. After reflecting and realizing that these people were not trying to help him, he no longer needs Mr. Norton or Brother Jack or Mr. Bledsoe; he only needs to overcome the struggle of himself.