Puppets: a Journey for Selfhood in a Cruel and Manipulated Society

Puppets: A journey for selfhood in a cruel and manipulated society. There are some works of literature today that display a good reflection of ideals in society. Literature often provides us an in- depth story where a protagonist is faced with many hardships and deal with them throughout their life- long journey. In the book Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, the main character and protagonist, struggles in search for self-identity. The protagonist is the narrator and remains unnamed throughout the novel; he is referred to as the Invisible Man. The book is set in a society that deals with discrimination and obliges to the laws made by people in power. In this cruel and Machiavellian dynamic based society, a journey towards responsibility for one’s self, selfhood, enlightenment and success is the protagonist 's life- long goal. In society, individuals who follow rules and aspire to proper conduct believe this to be an individual 's responsibility, for it makes them good citizens. Ellison portrays in the Invisible Man that responsibility is simply being accountable for ones own actions. In Creative Revolt: A Study of Wright, Ellison, and Dostoevsky, author Michael F. Lynch notes that "Ellison uses the word 'responsibility ' quite frequently in Invisible Man, stressing it as the corollary of equality and freedom" (171). In the United States, the demand for equality based on race has been a long and on going struggle. When there is a division between equality based on race, it tends to make society more selective in terms of trust and social treatment, which, in turn debates the idea of social responsibility. How one becomes responsible for the mistreatment of another. The Invisible Man knows of this race based equality struggle first hand amongst a society who refuses to value his individuality as he says “I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me” (Ellison 3). In the beginning of the novel, the Invisible Man is at the end of his High

Cited: 1. Ellison, Ralph, “Invisible Man” second vintage national edition, March 1995. print. 2. Yvonne, Fonteneau “World Literature Today” Vol. 64, No. 3, O.U. Centennial Issue (Summer, 1990), pp. 408-412, Published by: Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40146632 3. Prescott, Orville, “Books of the Times” http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/06/20/specials/ellison-invisible2.html 4. Lynch, Micheal F. “Creative Revolt: A Study of Wright, Ellison, and Dostoevsky,” New York : P. Lang, c1990. Print.