The Invisible Man: Prologue 

Honestly, society is a confusing thing isn't it? 

Ever since the beginning of this class, one thing has been clear. It's the whole idea that the individual - humanity in retrospect - is embedded into the fabrics of society in such a way that categorizing a singular person becomes increasingly unclear. It becomes an incessant battle, pinpointing whether someone symbolizes a victim or a victimizer - I mean, who truly is morally correct - what defines morally ethical? What makes a whistleblower right? It's these questions that gripped me while reading the prologue to what seems like a peculiarly interesting novel, Invisible Man. 

I'd like to think that all individuals have a small bundle of goodness deep within the depths of their being - of their composition. These bundles shine brighter than any other part of the individual - these bundles make them human. It makes a novel so exciting when this small bundle is apparent in the midst of pretentiousness, temptations, and violence. That's how I view the narrator of the novel thus far. Needless to say, this by no means makes the narrator morally sound. It becomes more difficult to feel sympathetic towards this man (as most novels usually have me feeling towards such passive aggressive characters) as the prologue progressed. He almost kills a man that bumps into him and insults him, he lives in a way that allows him to evade his rent and bills - and all as a means of embracing his invisibility? 

He claims that his "awareness" of his invisibility is what causes him to behave in this way. He claims that he did not become "alive" until he "discovered" his invisibility. But for some reason I can't help but imagine the narrator in a state of self-deception. Do his actions manifest those of enlightenment and awareness or those of succumbing to the level society has defined him as? It's just something that really got me thinking, very Grendel-like narrator if we're going to draw some comparisons here. Much like Grendel, I find it very hard to draw some distinct conclusions about his character. The narrator's encounter with the man that insults him is most significant, because it reminded me very much of Grendel's encounter with Wealtheow - both characters hovered between the decision of murdering someone - but an inner epiphany stopped the two of them. The narrator here claims he was both "disgusted and ashamed" (Ellison 5). These peculiar similarities strike me as significant, there must be something more to this narrator - something greater to this confusion that consumed me. 

Another thing that I found very interesting was the Louis Armstrong music that the narrator focused on, and I love this quote that the narrator uses to describe his sense of self: "Invisibility, let me explain, gives one a slightly different sense of time, you're never quite on the beat. Sometimes you're ahead and sometime behind." It was a brilliant piece of writing on the author's part and a perfect way to describe the narrator's position, also making me be better able to understand the narrator's feelings. I see the tinges of racism and society that are prevalent within the prologue, but I still remain slightly confused, hopefully my confusion is clarifies as I progress - but then again, this will probably allow for a plethora of new questions. 

Definitely looking forward to this novel, and I'll definitely be posting more as I progress through. Feel free to comment, I'd genuinely interested in seeing some of your thoughts!