AP English III
Tonight you need to finish reading Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" as well as move toward your next reading goal of being to the end of Chapter Twenty-Two of Invisible Man. Also, don't forget to sign up and attend your writing conferences. The sheets are on my door.
A day students. Please post a comment to respond to the following prompt. Draw on your knowledge of Invisible Man as well as your understanding of Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" to answer the following questions. Use textual references where necessary. Plato is available at this link.
Plato raises the idea in paragraph forty of transitioning between the world of light and the cave and that these transitions each affect the vision of the human. Plato says as well that these "bewilderments...from coming out of the light or from going into...[are] true of the mind's eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye." I would argue that the Invisible Man has suffered from these bewilderments multiple times throughout the text.
Which moment of the text do you think is the has provided the most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man? Is this a moment of going out of the light or going into it? Which of his eyes is this effecting? What is the overall importance?
Be thorough but concise in your answer. Show me that you've read the book and tell me something coherent - edit before you hit submit. Make sure you're focusing on the prompt. Be sure that your name is in your response so that I can assign credit.
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12 comments:
Lucy Wooldridge
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man is when he reads the letter from Bledsoe and realizes that Bledsoe was never a good man or a role model and that the college is not a place of freedom and learning, but one of oppression. This realization challenges everything the Invisible Man has ever believed about human nature, education and race. The Invisible Man is going into the light at this point, where he can see so much more than had initially been revealed to him in his captivity in school. He sees the hardship of African Americans in Harlem and how the world is filled with people who are fed up with society; previously he had never fully experienced the flaws in society. He uses his inner eye because he is able to look inside himself and connect with his individuality. It is while he is still connected to this individuality and this clarifying light that he gives his speech at the eviction. This is important because through this speech the Invisible Man is revealing his true emotion and his understanding of humanity and oppression as an individual rather than a puppet who only knows what he is told. Like the prisoner who goes into the light and realizes there is more than just one dimensional shadows, the Invisible Man goes into the wider world and sees, for a brief period that the men who were once inspirational to him are now representative of the abusive power and ignorance that the Invisible Man does not want to return to.
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man is when he is accused by Wrestrum of being more concerned about himself than the Brotherhood. This is a moment of leaving the light for the Invisible Man. At this point in the novel the Invisible Man believes to be in the light since he is in the Brotherhood. By being accused by Wrestrum, the Invisible Man is essentially being betrayed by his Brotherhood. The Invisible Man viewed the Brotherhood as the ultimate club and saw it as ensured inclusion. At this point the Invisible Man had questioned the welcome of some brothers but still viewed the organization as a whole to be a good thing that would look out for him and care about him. When Wrestrum accuses him, the other brothers are quick to believe what Wrestrum says, and accuse the Invisible Man as well. This immediate betrayal from the brothers tarnishes all prior thoughts the Invisible Man had on the Brotherhood, taking him out of the light. This is similar to when Plato explained the pain one endured while going into the light, which ultimately made one return to darkness. By the Invisible Man going into the light, the light being the Brotherhood in his eyes, he ended up in the dark. The Invisible Man was pained by Wrestrum while going, and solidifying his position in the Brotherhood. By enduring this pain and betrayal, the Invisible Man ended up leaving the Brotherhood, or the Harlem chapter, and entered the darkness which was the Women's chapter, or any chapter other than Harlem for that matter. The Invisible Man would be using his outer eye, his literal and society-inspired interpretation of what is light and dark. He believed the Brotherhood to be the best thing and anything else is bad. If he were to look deep within himself with his inner eye and look at the situation he would see that the Brotherhood is not light, and that it does not offer a promising result. Ultimately this point of bewilderment is important because when Wrestrum accuses the Invisible Man, he sees it as a bad thing, but in the end it will help him by taking him out of a twisted membership.
Anna Wyngaarden
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man occurs when he learns about the steady, yet drastic downfall of the Brotherhood organization. While the Brotherhood is losing its members however, the Exhorter population is growing in large amounts. With this information, the Invisible Man comes to the shocking conclusion that the emphasis is now on issues that are national and/or international in nature, rather than merely local--which are the type of issues that the Brotherhood advocated for. He sees this shift in the concerns of society, but this new way of thinking completely contradicts his concerns. He is used to seeing things from a limited, local point of view. He is used to only knowing what he sees on a daily basis, and for that reason he has been using his outer eye, looking only at what society has put before him. He felt safety in this limited point of view. Through it he found his comfort zone. He found himself most comfortable talking about issues that were relevant to the community around him, which is contradictory to the views of the Exhorters, who are seen as nationalists who prefer to emphasize issues that concern the entire nation rather than a simple community. This is similar to the cave prisoner in Plato's piece; he who did not know anything outside of what he encountered on a daily basis. The Invisible man thought that he had found himself through his expression of local issues, and although he believed so, he was still a product of society. This is the most important bewilderment to the Invisible Man because his views are what he thought shaped him, but what he didn't realize was that his views were shaped by those of society, and therefore he, as an individual, was shaped by society.
-Adrianna G.
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man is when he runs into Clifton on the street selling Sambo dolls. The Invisible Man has only ever seen Tod Clifton as a strong determined young African American that was fighting for equal rights. When he sees him on the street Clifton has hit rock bottom and has realized the truth about whites and society. The Sambo doll is Clifton’s way of expressing his frustration toward the truth when he says “and your dispossession, he [Sambo doll] lives upon the sunshine of your lordly smile.” (Ellison, 432) He’s saying that ignorant African Americans will do anything they can to please white society. The Invisible Man feels utterly betrayed when he sees Clifton and this is a moment of going out of the light. He doesn’t want to accept that Clifton has hit his breaking point and given up on the fight for equality but he has to. During this scene the Invisible Man is using his outer eye since he still doesn’t fully understand why Clifton has made his decision. Even at this point if he doubts the Brotherhood he still believes what Clifton is doing is wrong which means he’s unaware of the truth. The overall importance is that Clifton foreshadows what the Invisible Man will end up like. Once Clifton realized the truth and went into the light he quit the Brotherhood and became crazy (at least that’s what the Invisible Man thinks of him). Since we’ve already been introduced to future Invisible Man, we already know that he eventually goes crazy and cuts off all ties with society unable to function with all of the lies.
Mikki W-G
The Invisible Man is driven into the darkness when he becomes part of the Brotherhood. When he is thrust into such a high position, he is thoroughly confused yet trusts the Brothers. In reality, the Brothers are using the Invisible Man for their benefit only. This is evident as they force him to strip his speeches of his raw emotion and his more original, spontaneous language to replace it with their own ideas. This brings him further away from the truth instead of closer to it as he loses more of his identity and individuality. Although the Invisible Man is at first convinced that he found a meaningful position among caring characters, this progression into darkness becomes even more apparent as his expectations are crushed by Brother Wrestrum. Although we, as readers, and the Invisible Man see that this accusation by a fellow Brother is incorrect, the Invisible Man proceeds to follow their instructions. It is clear that he is confused by this betrayal, but still proceeds as told because of the influence the Brothers have on him. He now believes their ideas are correct, no matter if he as an individual believes a different truth. Parallel to Plato’s allegory, the Invisible man now believes the Brotherhood’s ideas as the chained men believed the shadow makers. The Brotherhood has increasingly clouded the Invisible Man’s vision in regards to truth, proving that his entrance into this group was a bewildered stumble into the darkness. Here he is only a pawn, taught false definitions of truth for the benefit of others. -Margaret Gunn
The Invisible Man, physically blinded by the light in a Brotherhood speech, finds himself bewildered again by the Brotherhood during his farce of a "trial" because of an accusation by Brother Wrestrum. Prior to this event, the Invisible Man had been, for lack of a better word, screwed, many times by whites and blacks. The Bledsoe letters did bewilder him, but he still does not see totally that he cannot trust anyone. Wrestrum's accusation, which the IM presumes is a lie to manipulate the white Brotherhood to increase his own standing, is the turning point in the IM's thinking. He now sees the light, that he has been manipulated the entire time by selfish and disingenuous people only guided by greed and self-interest. This affects his dark eye, he senses that he has been taken advantage of and "violently spun." The Invisible Man does keep some belief in the Brotherhood's trust in him, but he understands how and why people treat him as they do.
The greatest bewilderment experienced by the Invisible Man has to be opening Bledsoe’s letter and discovering the true nature of all that he has held sacred. Although the Invisible Man already had doubts about Bledsoe’s integrity based on their previous conversations, until this point he had continued to live with an unrealistic optimism about his chances of returning to college. Thus, it is in this moment that everything comes crashing down; everything the Invisible Man thought he knew about the world is suddenly brought into question. This experience is similar to being born again; our protagonist is now living in a world he really knows nothing about. In this way, the Invisible Man is heading into the light; he is finally being exposed that the nitty-gritty truth of the world. This transition is neither smooth nor painless and the Invisible Man’s experience mirrors that of the men leaving the cave in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.” At the college, Bledsoe was trying to pass off a lightbulb as the sun and when the Invisible Man finally escapes from the shadow of the ivory towers, the sun blinds him, leaving him disoriented and bitter. Just as someone temporarily blinded stumbles around aimlessly, the Invisible Man searches for meaning and truth by slowly feeling his way around the world, starting at the factory, moving to Mary’s, and eventually the Brotherhood, everyday growing a little more accustom to the blinding truth around him.
As the Invisible Man is blinded, it’s his outer eyes that are truly affected; he doesn’t question himself, rather he is led to question everything else around him. As we discussed previously in class, the Invisible Man is on a quest to find the truth, but because he is blinded, he is forced to use others to find this truth and help guide him, a phenomenon especially evident in his dealings with the clandestine Brotherhood leadership. Another powerful change evoked in our narrator is his shift from the naivety of college life into cynicism and paranoia induced by the real world. Thus this single moment is a critical turning point in the text as it is what sets the Invisible Man on his quest and is the first step towards true invisibility.
-Ben Krupa
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man occurs when he reads Bledsoe's letter and has to rethink what he always thought was true. He realizes that Bledsoe was not helping him and rather corrupting him. The Invisible Man starts to see the light, or truth, that had been unimaginable until now. He rethinks the university and how this man with power who use to be a role model was actually oppressing him. Once the Invisible Man starts thinking through all the aspects of his life with this new information and idea in his head he sees more of the reality and truth of life. In a difficult time, the eviction speech helps the Invisible Man let out his personal beliefs. This was important for him because he felt useful and worth something because of the successful speech. AT first Bledsoe's letter seems like a horrible crash of reality but it helps the Invisible Man grow through out the text. He needed more than this letter to see the entire truth. However, this was a major part of his journey towards the light.
-Hope Allen
The most significant bewilderment to the Invisible Man was speaking to the crowd at Clifton's funeral because he begins to question the effectiveness of the Brotherhood. The Invisible Man is going into the light unwillingly at this point because he is developing his own opinions of a controversial social issue rather than attempting to learn the Brotherhood’s viewpoint on a hot topic like he did prior to the arena speech.
Similar to when Plato describes the first prisoner who is “reluctantly dragged” to the light, the Invisible Man is “standing up on this so-called mountain” (Ellison 457) where he comes to terms with the reality of the situation. At first he was still shocked with what he saw, but then he tries to explain to the crowd why the cop pulled the trigger, showing his rapid transition into the light. On the last step, the Invisible Man is able to see the sun with his mind’s eye. Plato says the sun is when a person “will see him in his own proper place” which the Invisible Man does when he sees the individuals in the crowd instead of a large group. Following in the prisoner’s progression, this will lead the Invisible Man to consider himself “the guardian of all that is in the visible world”, allowing for the Invisible Man to reach the crowds more directly.
I think the initial and most significant point of bewilderment is when the IM reads the letter from Dr Bledsoe, and starts to grasp the fact that pretty much everything he was taught and told at the college was for the oppression of the black race and black advancement. This is a huge change for the invisible man because it goes against everything he ever believed about the education of african americans at the college and about how everything in society is intertwined, influenced by one if not several of the same social factors. In terms of Plato's writing, it can be compared to the individuals ascent to the light, because it's definitely not a painless conclusion to come to after believing something completely opposite of the truth because you were oppressed by those you looked up to and admired such as Bledsoe. The IM is using his inner eye because he's coming to his own conclusion and own realizations, whereas if he was using his outer eye he'd be influenced/ seeing the majority opinions view. This is reflected as an actual event in the book when the IM gives a spur of the moment lecture at the eviction that addresses all his own views and not just those of a group he's a part of. Over all, this is important because it's a point of emotional and mental maturity as he comes to a bitter realization about society, which as we can tell by the prologue he eventually manages to completely escape from.
The most significant point of bewilderment we see in the Invisible Man is when he is trying to become part of the Brotherhood. He thinks that by getting power he will become visible, but the reality of the situation is that the other [whites] are still blinded by racism; therefore putting him "back in his place" the whole time he thinks he is becoming a stronger individual in society. Before the Invisible Man went up to say his speech at the rally in chapter 16/17, he saw a photograph of a former prizefight champion who had lost his vision in a brutal fight that had later died in a retirement home for the blind. As the reader we can see the irony and foreshadowing of the racism and blindness, but his confusion lies within hisself and his ability to understand and see the bigger issue; that everyone else is still blinded in the dark. In order to realize that everyone else is in the dark, he has to be in the dark as well, because in the light he is blinded by all the "good" and praise he receives. The light seems like it should be a good thing where there is equality and no confusion, but the powerfulness of the brightness in which the Brotherhood is has flaws that the Invisible man has not yet seen, and will have to listen to his grandfather before being able to grasp that reality. Like Machiavelli's piece, it is all about seeming versus being. He is [slowly] coming out of the light but is also still in the darkness because he believes that the Brotherhood is a true and unflawed part of society.
Laura Owen
Katie Spring
The most significant bewilderment that the Invisible Man has faced is when he has sex with the white woman from the downtown district. For the bulk of his life, the Invisible Man has looked at white people almost as pedestals that should simply not be touched, and that was his shadow as Plato would call it. Southern society told him that interracial interactions were wrong and unacceptable, and he simply believed it and when the woman began to seduce him, he panicked for a moment because he was beginning to step into the light. The Invisible Man felt confused because sex with this woman was everything that he was taught should not be happening, yet that is inevitably what was happening. This moment cast some light on the Invisible Man's perception of white people, showing him that, in the grand scheme of things, white people are not these pedestals; they are simply human beings and interactions aren't wrong.
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