We had a really intense conversation in class today, and Sierra brought up the point of visibility (or invisibility) vs. identity. I didn't really get to finish up my comment today, and I had loads still left to say. I think visibility and a sense of identity are two completely different ideas. After reading this whole, harrowing account of the narrator's self discovery, I can say that as a reader, I understand the narrator on a much deeper level than other characters in the novel do. But, I still can't ever say that I understand him completely. We almost always try to understand other people by comparing ourselves to them, by placing ourselves inside of their situations, and by seeing how closely our reactions correlate with theirs. We all do this to an extent subconsciously, but when there is a huge discrepancy between our actions and those of another, it becomes increasingly difficult to see past the differences. I can say that at least in real life no one ever really fully understands another human being on the level that they understand themselves. I've known my best friend for a long time now, and most of the time I like to think I know exactly what she's like, but sometimes when I pause to think, I realize that there are lots of things that I don't really know about her at all. And that's okay, because I think that's how things are supposed to be. The only thing we can do is learn to accept that there will always be parts of us that will remain invisible to others because we all think and feel in different ways.
At the end of the novel, the narrator finally comes to terms with his state of invisibility, but more importantly he has learned to understand his inner identity. All people are products of society to a certain degree. I am a product of society, a product of my environment, and a product of the expectations that I have grown up with. I can think that I am a certain person, but I also know that if I was placed in a set of completely different circumstances, I may as well have been a completely different person. We like to believe that there are parts of us that remain constant, and those are the parts that are hidden deep away. Ellison's theory of self discovery is effective, I think. The only way we can really uncover the deepest parts of ourselves is by rejecting outside influences that surround us. None of us have to go down underground into a hole, but at some point in our lives we need to understand ourselves and realize that our own values, and our own perceptions of ourselves are more important than the labels that other people put on us. You don't have to be 'visible' to be at a state of self understanding.
I think that part of the sense that, even at the end of the novel, we don't fully "understand" the narrator is a result of Ellison's repeated use of paradox to characterize him. Quite literally, paradoxes resist simple, straightforward understanding--they are both/and, not either/or. The narrator is a "man of action" who embodies "a world of possibilities" while living in a hole in the ground, unknown to everyone and nameless. We might feel we understand something important and profound about the struggle that LED to his assertions of self-knowledge, and we can trace the tragi-comic series of events that lead him to this point (when we often feel, smugly, that we "know" more than he does about what's really going on)--and this does amount to a real and significant understanding, as you say. But it has its limits. By dwelling on paradox, Ellison asserts that perhaps it's in the nature of character that it CAN'T be fully "understood" in a simple sense by anyone. The narrator celebrates the freedom to be both/and.
ReplyDeleteAh! The way you explain it makes sense, and I guess I did get caught in Ellison's paradox (he's pretty tricky...). I think with the Narrator, and just Invisible Man in general, its hard to walk away with a clear sense of understanding on any matter since everything is presented in a way that makes it easy to keep thinking of and get lost in thought with.
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