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After the Invisible Man
Ralph Ellison's iconic novel Invisible Man won the 1953 National Book award and informed discussions of race and identity for decades. He died in the mid 90s without publishing a second novel, but now the literary executor of his estate has pulled his notes and musings together as Three Days Before the Shooting, a massive tale with many threads.
The story of how this came to be is an unlikely one: In 1977 a young professor at Lewis and Clark College sent an essay about Ellison to the author he'd long admired. They became friends, and later John Callahan was charged with bringing Ellison's decades of unpublished work to light. One section, titled Juneteeth, was published ten years ago, but that's just part of the novel out now.
Did you read Invisible Man? How did it impact your perceptions of race and identity? And what did you imagine as a follow-up?
UPDATE, 01/29/10 2:02 PM:
John Callahan and co-editor Adam Bradley will read from and discuss Three Days Before the Shooting February 17 at Lewis and Clark. Details here.
Tagged as: books · history · race · ralph ellison
Photo credit: Estate of Ralph Ellison
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Folks,
This is very different for some obvious reasons, but (like me) you might find a few interesting resonances. Here's an interview with Robert Levin, the Harvard musicologist who has made a name for himself by finishing Mozart's unfinished work.
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Great article David.
I can see how Levin reinterpreting Mozart and Beethoven is like the 2.8x10^5 interpretations of Around Midnight. What did Herbie Hancock feel as he reinterpreted Nirvana's All Apologies?
Just as Levin immersed himself in Mozart, Callahan brought Juneteenth to life by immersing himself in Ellison's writing.
Just because Mozart and Ellison have exited stage left doesn't mean we're done exploring and appreciating their genius. I enjoy thinking that if Ellison struggled with his second book for 40 years, why shouldn't those who find resonance with Ellison's writing spend 40 years rereading, augmenting and reinterpreting?
I enjoy when unfinished works like Juneteenth come to life because it gives us another opportunity to explore the genius of, and learn from, our greatest predecessors.
Excellent food for further thought. Thank you.
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I read Invisible Man while dating an African American man whom I eventually married. Because I am white, I may not have read it otherwise. I am the parent of three biracial children and a member of the Oregon Council on Multiracial Affairs (OCMA) in a lifelong effort to be as supportive and understanding as possible to race-related issues which our society presents to the African-American community. My children are among the growing population of multiracial Americans central to Brian Chinhema's new film, Multiracial Identity. The film will be screened to an open focus group at PSU and you're invited to the screening and conversation at 6:30 p.m. on Wed. March 3, Smith Center room 228, 1825 SW Broadway, in Portland, OR.
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I just finished reading Juneteenth last December, and it strikes me it would make an excellent movie! I would love to see someone like Clint Eastwood direct it, especially seeing how delicately he handles period pieces (like Changeling). It has some wonderful cinematic references and scenes, the main character thinks his mother is in a movie he watches -- and later he becomes a free-lance photographer. Some great stuff! And also, besides race relations, the book encompases Christian themes like transformation and self-sacrifice! It's too bad it was never fully completed. The vague end of the book also makes me think a director like PT Anderson would be perfect to handle material like this!
What do you think?
P.S. Although a black director (like Spike Lee) would probably be just as good
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I read Invisible Man in highschool, and then again after graduating from college-- it continues to be one of my favorite books of all time. It really speaks to the human experience of everyone, it is a universal novel about the human condition. And yes, race is part of that-- but as a caucasian girl growing up in the subburbs, it totally spoke to me. I too am invisible-- I'm not any color (or am I every color--and making myself invisible?).
I'm not really comfortable with folks publishing his stuff posthumously. I'll read it but look-- if you wrote Invisible Man it doesn't matter if you ever write anything else. You've written a masterpiece, and you are off the hook.
My favorite quote if the bit about "
Life is to be lived, not controlled; and humanity is won by continuing to play in face of certain defeat." -
Great conversation - thank you for bringing this topic alive. I relate so much to Prof. Callahan's experience reading Invisible Man. It was a lightning bolt for - changed how I thought about myself in relation to the world, and how I thought about other people. Although the book is about isolation, amazingly, it ends up opening up the part of each of us we're too insecure, afraid, embarassed to reveal to anyone else.
Is it possible Ellison ended up exploring/revealing so much in Invisible Man that there just wasn't more - or not on as cohesive and profound a way as in IM - for him to create?
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I am not an invisible man in the Ralph Ellison sense, but I am an invisible man in the culture of the USA. My father is an almost exclusively main stream white (Anglo) with a very slight admixture of Native American, so slight as to lead to family differences of opinion over which nation was mixed with the European strain (Cree, Creek, Cherokee, etc.). My mother was a mestiza (mixed native and European) Mexican-American. My sister looks Anglo (green eyes, fair skin), my brother looks stereotypically Mexican (but speaks no Spanish) and I am a Mexican-American that can pass for Anglo or Italian or Jewish, etc., and I have a BA in Spanish.
I look like the societal norm, i.e., European, but am not entirely. I understand the conversations around me in Spanish but hesitate to assist those in need because I do not wish to offend them by imposing my assistance because I look so Anglo. When I do assist I never know if it is resented because fellow Hispanics are too polite to let me know that they resent my assistance.
Here I am, equipped and able to help but hobbled because I look like just another white guy helping the “disadvantaged”.
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I read Invisible Man after I graduated from college and was surprised how my life's story parallels the story's themes. I first attended a predominately black university and graduated from a predominately white one. My university experience knocked my life on its side and it didn't get up for a long time.
So I resonate with Ellison's descriptions of black southern university life. The description of how the protagonist moves to New York and descends into insanity due to his social invisibility is one of the best metaphorical descriptions of the "black experience in America" I've ever read. Wonderful because the description strikes close to home in a language I understand.
What I've learned from my parents and Invisible Man is that I define my reality and how I perceive it. Descending into the Invisible Man's Hell is akin to intellectual bungy jumping. It's thrilling and transforming to walk in another person's skin for a few minutes, but I don't want to hang from ropes tied to my ankles in that world too long.
Isn't one purpose of our life to understand who we truly are as we work to understand and overcome our shortcomings? Thankfully we have literature which allows us to temporarily explore concepts and perspectives alien to our own.