The Visible Impact of "Invisible Man"

“I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe . . . 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, because people refuse to see me.”

These words were uttered by a “nameless narrator” in Ralph Ellison’s novel “Invisible Man.”

On Nov. 8, the novel and the its author were the inspiration for a one-day conference at North Carolina Central University, “African-American Fiction After Ralph Ellison and ‘Invisible Man,’” sponsored by the Department of English to celebrate the novel's 50th anniversary.

“Ellison opened up the spectrum of African American literature so that it could be embraced by whites, blacks, Hispanics, etc.,” said Carol Richards, a graduate student at Duke University, who explained how Ellison used irony to raise political and social issues. “Ellison viewed all races as having a common thread that unites them into one.”

Michele Ware, assistant professor of English at NCCU, compared Ellison to Percival L. Everett, author of the recent “Erasure,” a satire on race and the publishing industry. Everett, said Ware, owes a great debt to Ellison. According to Ware, they both suffered from the stereotype of not being “black enough.”

Jennie Alibasic/Campus Echo UNC-Chapel Hill English professor Trudier Harris-Lopez, who has authored nine books on African American writers.

Harris-Lopez explored the influence Ellison had on Brent Wade’s 1991 novel, “Company Man,” a psychological study of a corporate black man.

According to Harris-Lopez, the main character in Wade’s novel, Billy Covington, is a representation of the “invisible man” in corporate America.

“The intertextural relationship of ‘Company Man’ to ‘Invisible Man’ raises questions about where Ellison’s invention leaves off and Brent Wade's creativity begins,” Harris-Lopez said.

Taboo topics only hinted at in Ellison’s novel, such as sexual ambiguity and isolation from other blacks and black culture, are expanded through Wade’s work, according to Harris-Lopez.

She saw many parallels between the main characters in “Invisible Man” and those in “Company Man.”

One is the belief that displaying any black stereotype will thwart one’s chances of becoming successful in life.

The invisible man makes it a point to mold himself into an image that is appeasing to whites, such as not talking loudly.

In “Company Man,” Billy Covington takes this a step further by disassociating himself from blacks at his job and repressing his sexual feelings toward his wife in order to avoid the stereotype of the oversexed black male.

“I love Ralph Ellison,” said Harris-Lopez. “I did my dissertation on his work and the work of two other African American writers, so I’ve been an Ellison fan as long I have been in this profession.”

Faculty and students from NCCU, Duke University, University of North Carolina-Greensboro and St. Augustine’s College presented papers.

Tonia Price and Stacy Cooper are students at North Carolina Central University. They write for The Campus Echo.