2130_american lit module 3_ralph ellison

Ralph Ellison

The Norton Anthology of American Literature, 8th Edition | Copyright © 2012 W.W. Norton & Company

Ralph Ellison


• Born in Oklahoma in 1914

• Attended the Tuskeegee Institute on a state scholarship

• Studied music in college; played the trumpet

• Moved to New York City in 1936, where he met novelist Richard Wright

• Began writing Invisible Man in 1945 (it was published in 1952)

Ellison’s Early Life


“[O]ur life is a war and I have been a traitor all my born days, a spy in the enemy’s country . . . Live with your head in the lion’s mouth. I want you to overcome ’em with yesses, undermine ’em with grins, agree ’em to death and destruction, let ’em swoller you till they vomit or bust wide open.”

Invisible Man


Invisible Man


“I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids—and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me.”

Invisible Man


“Brothers and sisters, my text this morning is the ‘Blackness of Blackness.’ ” And a congregation of voices answered: “That blackness is most black, brother, most black . . .”

Invisible Man


“What did I doTo be so black,And blue?”

Invisible Man


Invisible Man


“Everyone fought hysterically. It was complete anarchy. Everybody fought everybody else. No group fought together for long. Two, three, four, fought one, then turned to fight each other, were themselves attacked.”

Invisible Man


Invisible Man

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Ralph Ellison

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2130_american lit module 3_ralph ellison

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