If history was a gambler

Throughout Invisible Man, the narrator struggles to find his own place in the world and be seen as who he really is. He strives to be like Frederick Douglass, and build his own name for himself in history. This theme of searching for identity as a part of history is recurrent throughout the entire novel, and in the scenes of Tod Clifton’s death, it is especially significant. The narrator is deeply unnerved by Clifton’s decision to leave the Brotherhood, because to him the Brotherhood is the only thing preventing them both from being invisible and forgotten. But Clifton's death, we see that the Brotherhood, the narrator, and the community all have different versions of what happened, and none of these histories tell the whole truth.

When the narrator first encountered Clifton selling the marionette dolls in the street, he was surprised and confused about why Clifton would want to let go of all the influence and respect he has by the brotherhood. “Only in the Brotherhood,” the narrator thinks, “[can] we make ourselves known, [can] we avoid being empty Sambo dolls”(434).  After years just following the path others laid out for him, the narrator thinks the Brotherhood is an opportunity to choose on his own what he wants to do, and make his mark on history. Those outside the Brotherhood are nothing but a “void of faceless faces, of soundless voices, lying outside of history” (439). He views the Brotherhood as his opportunity to be seen for who he really is, instead of being confined to a predetermined script.

But after Clifton dies, it starts to seem like that’s not the real situation. The narrator soon sees that there are several different stories of Clifton’s death, and none seem to be saying the same thing. The Brotherhood considers Clifton a traitor. The police see him as a criminal. And after hearing the narrator’s speech, the people of Harlem see Clifton as a martyr for the black community.

By dying at the hands of the policemen, Clifton seems to reenter history; everyone knows who he is, and after the narrator’s powerful memorial speech, he is now a symbol of the black struggle. But they don’t see the real Clifton. Everyone tells a different story, and even though some might be mostly true, every one of these histories are carefully crafted to achieve a predetermined goal. Contrary to what the narrator believes, rejoining history has made Clifton even less of his own person; instead, a traitor, a martyr, a criminal, his life is still defined by whatever is most convenient to the narrative, and he is even more invisible than before.

Optical Allusions

Chapter ten of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man follows the narrator’s first, surreal day working at the Liberty Paints factory. The prize product, Optic White paint, is supposedly so white that the government relies on it to paint their national monuments. And yet the process the narrator sees is messy, frantic, and fragile enough that a few drops of the wrong black liquid can ruin an entire batch of paint. This imagery of the perfect white paint, but with a conflicted and volatile history, has important implications in Ellison’s critique of American society.

Lucius Blockway tells the narrator the paint is“so white you can paint a chunka coal and you’d have to crack it open with a sledgehammer to prove it wasn’t white clear through,” and Kimbro remarks upon how the batch is “white as George Washington’s Sunday-go-to-meetin’ wig and as sound as the all-mighty dollar.” The narrator mentions how the buildings of the college are kept brightly painted, to keep them looking respectable and maintain the facade of the college. But the Golden Day and Trueblood’s cabin, which show the reality of life for many people, are left to peel in the sun. Optic White, a thin layer of paint with which Liberty Paints strives to “Keep America Pure,” represents the similarly thin facade that separates what people see from the reality.

The contradictions of the paint itself and the method used to make it are significant. The paint itself isn’t as pure white as it wants to be: small drops of black liquid are required, and they are a vital part of the process even as they are quickly drowned out by the white. And inside the factory, even as it revolves around making uniformly white paint, there is class conflict on a small scale between unions, workers and supervisors. The factory churns out massive amounts of paint every day, but the system ultimately depends on one man and can be ruined by just a small amount of the wrong additive.

The paint factory and Optic White can be read as an allegory for American society. Optic White strives to cover up anything that doesn’t look right, and is so good at doing so that it can even cover up the blackness of coal. The oppressive system in America at the time made similar efforts to conform to the white narrative. And yet even when the paint seems to be successful, there is still conflict, and the entire system is much more fragile than it might seem.

The Real Significance of Bigger as a "Native Son" of Racism in America

 

 One of the most prominent themes in Native Son is how Bigger's city is sharply divided between blacks and whites. “Half the time,” he says, “I feel like I’m on the outside of the world peeping in through a knothole in the fence.” He and his family live together in one cramped room, in the only corner of town the white landlords allow them to live in. Bigger and his friends make their living as thieves - but they only rob other black people, because the white police won’t care. Bigger’s life is confined to a cramped and dismal script, with the white world always looming overhead. From the moment he steps out of his house, Bigger is confronted by a white face, “fleshy but stern,” reminding him that “YOU CAN’T WIN!”

Growing up in this environment, Bigger’s understanding of himself and the world around him would seem to be shaped by racism and the ever-present class divide that puts whites above blacks. He works for the Daltons and ostensibly plays the part of the obedient young black man perfectly. But still, he is an outlier, even among his own family. While his mother and siblings are proud of his new job offer, Bigger sees it as a “cheap surrender.” He eschews religion as well, seeing it as just another false hope for those who’ve given up on this life. For Bigger, nothing seems to be able to satisfy his “gnawing hunger and restless aspiration,”  or distract him from the “great natural force” of white people that “as long as they lived here in this prescribed corner of the city, they paid mute tribute to."
       Bigger Thomas, as a character, stands out from the rest. And because Native Son is a protest against the racist system of 1930s Chicago, Bigger isn't just a fictional character, but a message to the reader. The title of the novel gives a hint at what that message might be. In the words of Max: “The consciousness of Bigger Thomas, and millions like him, white and black, form the quicksands upon which the foundations of our nation rests.”

      Bigger, the “Native Son,” not raised in America but born from it. Born from the centuries of oppression his ancestors faced and the segregated, racist system he still lived in himself. But also born in equal part from those classic American virtues, stubbornness and hope and a refusal to accept unfair circumstances. Bigger Thomas is not unique, Wright tells us: he is an inevitable and constant result of racism in America. He is not necessarily an inspirational, moral, or particularly sympathetic person. Rather, Bigger’s significance lies in the fact that he is a Native Son, one of many such characters, whose very existence serves as a reminder of how the system of racism can never truly succeed.