Melting Clocks

Throughout Invisible Man, one immediately apparent aspect of the novel is its continued commitment to depicting events in not strictly realistic terms. It's not as if the chain of events that is shown in the novel is literally impossible, just somewhat unlikely. From the very beginning of the novel, where the protagonist reveals he lives in the basement of an apartment building surrounded by 1369 glowing lightbulbs, we are thrust into a world we don't entirely understand, one that is close to ours but is just slightly off-kilter. In addition to single instances in the novel seeming strange, there is also a thread of interconnectivity that runs through the narrator's entire life, much more than would occur in real life or even in a realistic novel. For example, the narrator is told early in the book by Mr. Norton to look to Emerson for self-realization. Then, much later, the narrator seeks a job from a Mr. Emerson, who gives him a job with Liberty...paint company. It is this weird, almost dreamlike filter that the novel presents the world in that allows the narrator and the reader to analyze the serious issues presented in the novel, such as racism.

A prime example of the completely surreal nature of Invisible Man comes very early in the book. In chapter one, the narrator is invited to give a speech on humility and strength through obedience to a group of white men. However, when he gets there, he is first required to box with other young black men in a boxing arena. As he is brought out, he sees a smoky room full of screaming white men, and then a naked, beautiful blonde woman with a tattoo of an American flag on her navel is brought out. This riles up the boxers and the audience, and as the woman crowdsurfs her way out of the ring, the boxers are blindfolded and begin fighting. This is clearly not something that would happen in real life, and vague symbolism lies scattered throughout the section, such as the American flag tattoo, or the electrified coins the young men dive for that end up being brass advertisements, but this dreamlike episode the narrator goes through allows the reader to think critically about what Ellison is really trying to say. It is obvious that he isn't implying there are secret Battle Royales that plague the South, but at the same time there is an implicit judgment here about how the black community is made to fight each other, and is forced to do tricks to receive petty cash (an idea that pops up much, much later when the narrator encounters a similarly surreal black Americana coin bank). It is only because the event is so ridiculous that we are forced to think of it as symbolic, not as a realist attempt at telling a story.