Tuskegee's Past -- Invisible Man's Nostalgia

Invisible Man, 3-135

The statue of Booker T. Washington at Tuskegee Institute (now University)


"Then in my mind's eye I see the bronze statue of the Founder, the cold Father symbol, his hands outstretched in the breathtaking gesture of lifting a veil that flutters in hard, metallic folds above the face of a kneeling slave; and I stand puzzled, unable to decide whether the veil is really being lifted, or lowered more firmly in place; whether I am witnessing a revelation or a more efficient blinding" (36)

A few things to consider and discussion questions for Tuesday's reading (3-135)

Prologue


1. How is the Invisible Man (IM) invisible? How does his invisibility function? Does he desire to be seen?

2. In particular, how does his invisibility function  in the scene of violence (the "mugging") with the tall blonde man on 4-5?

3. Is invisibility more dangerous than sleepwalking, or vice versa?

4. Where is the IM when we meet him? What is significant about his location and "hibernation" (6)?

5. Why does he desire light so much? Is there a hidden meaning lurking in the name "Monopolated Light & Power?" (7, 13).

6. What the heck happens after he smokes that reefer and listens to Armstrong's "What Did I Do to Be So Black and Blue"? (8-12)

7. What does invisibility have to do with (ir)responsibility? Who is responsible for making the IM invisible? Did he choose to become invisible? Why, why not, or in which ways?

8. Whose/what interests are the "higher interests of society"? Is it better (or safer) to be awake or dreaming?

Chapter One


1. In the prologue, the IM suggests that the world operates through contradiction. You think things will go in one direction, but they end up flying right back at your head: “Not like an arrow, but a boomerang. (Beware of those who speak of the spiral of history; they are preparing a boomerang. Keep a steel helmet handy.) I know; I have been boomeranged across my head so much that I now can see the darkness of lightness” (6).

So what is the meaning of boomeranging or being boomeranged?

Consider the first lines of chapter one: In his search for himself, he accepts the answers that others give him, “though they were often in contradiction and even self-contradictory. I was naïve. I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which I, and only I, could answer. It took me a long time and much painful boomeranging of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: That I am nobody but myself. But first I had to discover that I am an invisible man!” (15).

2. Before Spring Break, I dropped a few suggestions about shame. What role does it play in his (changing) attitude on slavery and his ancestors' (namely his grandparents') past? (15)

3. You should have noticed some echoes of an earlier reading assignment throughout this chapter. Which assignment? What is the significance of it here? 

4. What does IM's grandfather communicate in his last words (16-17)? Why is his final lesson so unsettling for the IM and his family? 

5. What goes on the battle royal? Why is the naked white woman with the American flag tattoo present (19)? Why does IM continue to trust and respect these figures while they violently and indirectly exploit the woman, himself, and the other students? Why do the other students go along with it? Why is Tatlock unwilling to make a deal in the ring? (24-5). 

6. See question 3 -- what's the deal with IM's speech? At least the only part of it we are presented with?

7. Is his briefcase and scholarship fairly won? Is fairness even possible? What does it say about IM that he is able to forgive the men, accept the scholarship, and is not even upset by the fact that the “‘good hard American cash’” that he has struggled for is in fact “brass pocket tokens advertising a certain make of automobile” (32)?

8. What's the deal with the circus dream? 

Chapter Two

1. Is the college really like IM initially remembers it? Or is it dried out and spread with the contents of the cistern (as on 36)?

2. (See statue above). Is this a veiling or an unveiling? Would bird poop really make this statue more commanding?

3. Is IM’s anxiety the main reason that he messes up the drive with Norton? Consider his description of his “pride and anxiety” on 37 and his embarrassment and fear of punishment for the innocent act of honking the horn. Also consider his dread that Norton will notice his “treachery” on 40.

4. What is the significance of Norton’s daughter in spurring him to support the school? (42-3).

5. What is the history of Trueblood’s relationship with the school and likely that of others of the country people who are not interested in being “uplifted” or educated, but are happy where they are? (46-7). How does IM halfheartedly try to keep Norton away from the Truebloods? “‘They – they don’t seem very bright’” – “‘but they hate us up at the school. They never come there’” (48)? Why is Norton still drawn to them?

6. What is Norton’s initial reaction to IM’s description of the Truebloods’ situation? See 50 – “‘No, no, no!’ … ‘Not that! No…’” Why is he driven on to find out more? Why is his first reaction to Trueblood himself “‘You have survived…But is it true?...You did and are unharmed!...You have looked upon chaos and are not destroyed!’” (51). What might explain Norton’s reaction that IM describes as “something like envy and indignation” (51)?

7. How do the reactions of the local whites and blacks to Truebloods’ situation differ? How does Norton react to his vivid story (see 69)? How about the IM?

Chapter Three

1. Who are the vets? What were their occupations prior to their institutionalization? Why do you think they were institutionalized? What is the background of the vet that actually helps Norton and IM?

2. How does the helpful vet's speech on 93-5 align with the condition of the IM as suggested in the prologue? How about with the dying words of the IM’s grandfather and his circus dream? Is this vet really “‘insane as all the rest,’” as Norton pronounces him (95)?

Chapter Four


1. What is so attractive about Bledsoe and the founder for IM? What does the IM want out of life at this point?

2. How does Bledsoe treat the IM after hearing the first of the incident (101-2) – consider particularly his admonition: “‘Damn what he (Norton) wants…Haven’t you got the sense God gave a dog? We take these white folks where we want them to go, we show them what we want them to see. Don’t you know that? I thought you had some sense” (102).

Why is IM surprised by Bledsoe’s attitude toward Norton? “Dr. Bledsoe’s attitude toward Mr. Norton was the most confusing of all. I dared not repeat what he’d said, for fear that it would lessen my chances of remaining in school. It just wasn’t true, I had misunderstood. He couldn’t have said what I thought he [106] had said” (104-5) – IM remembers all of Bledsoe's usual condescension and humility and yet Bledsoe speaks to Norton with a “grandmotherly concern” and “croon[s]” to him on 103. 

3. What is the significance of the grass being green and the attitudes of the other students toward the founder and the school’s mythos (105, 107)?

4. How does Mr. Norton feel about IM? Why do his eyes keep narrowing on 108? Clearly, IM does not comprehend the full meaning and repercussions of his actions at this point.

Chapter Five 

1. What is the significance of the songs performed for the visitors in light of our previous discussions of slave songs and spirituals (111)? Consider the fact that Trueblood used to perform for them as well (47). 

2. Is the school really a product of black agency and white generosity or a more complicated relationship between races and regions? Are blacks really given everything by the whites as IM originally figures (112) or is it something much more complicated that underlies Barbee’s speech? Recall Norton’s admission that he “know[s his] life rather well” (38) and that he is unsure if the vision for the school was the founder’s vision or his own (39)?

* Keep this question in mind for Chapter Six (for Thursday) -- Do you think that the Founder worked the millionaires in a similar way to the way that Bledsoe continues to?

3. Which aspects of Barbee’s speech cause the IM to “feel [his] guilt and accept it” (134). “For although I had not intended it, any act that endangered the continuity of the dream was an act of treason” (134)?

Quotes from Booker T. Washington Speeches

All quotes from the Selected Speeches of Booker T. Washington, Ed. E. Davidson Washington. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc. 1932). 


From "The Negro and his Relation to the Economic Progress of the South," an address delivered before the Southern Industrial Convention in Huntsville, Alabama on October 12, 1899:

On whites and blacks coexisting in the south --
"...although a negro and an ex-slave myself, there is no white man whose heart is more wrapped up in every interest of the South and loves it more dearly than is true of myself. The South can have no sorrow that I do not share can have no prosperity that I do not rejoice in; can commit no error that I do not deplore, can take no step forward that I do not approve.

Different in race, in color, in history, we can teach the world that, although thus differing, it is possible for us to dwell side by side and live in peace, in material prosperity. We can be one, as I believe we will be in a larger degree in the future, in sympathy, purpose, forbearance, and mutual helpfulness. Let him who would embitter, who would bring strife between your race and mind, 'be accursed in his basket and his store, accursed in the fruit of his body and in the fruit of his land.' No man can plan the degradation of another race without being himself degraded. The highest test of the civilization of a race is its willingness to extend a helping hand to the less fortunate"  (79).


[A few additional quotes will be filled in here. I have bad xeroxes.]

"[...]the whole problem of the Negro in the South [rests itself] upon the question as to whether he makes himself of such indispensable service to his neighbor, to his community, that no one can fill his place better in the body politic. There is no other safe course for the [Negro] to pursue. If the black man in the South has a friend in his white neighbor, and a still larger number of friends in his own community, he has a protection and a guarantee of his rights that will be more potent and more lasting than any our Federal Congress or any outside power can confer. While the Negro is grateful for the opportunities which he enjoys in the business of the South, you should remember that you are in debt to the black man for furnishing you with labor that is almost a stranger to strikes, lock-outs, and labor that is one with you in language, sympathy, religion, and patriotism, labor that has never been tempted to follow the red flag of anarchy, but always the safe flag of the country and the spotless banner of the Cross" (81)

"The slave's chain and the master's alike are broken; 
The one curse of the race held both in tether; 
They are rising, all are rising -- 
The black and the white together" (86)

From Washington's First Annual Address as President, delivered at the first meeting of the National Negro Business League in Boston, MA on August 24, 1900. 


"This organization does not overlook the fact that mere material possessions are not, and should not be made, the chief end of life, but should be used as a means of aiding us in securing our rightful place as citizens and of enlarging out opportunities for securing that education and development which enhance our usefulness and produce that tenderness and goodness of heart which will make us live for the benefit of our fellow men and for the promotion of our country's highest welfare" (88).

"Let every Negro strive to become the most useful and indispensable man in his community. A useless, shiftless, idle class is a menace and a danger to any community. When an individual produces what the world wants, whether it is a product of hand, head, or heart, the world does not long stop to inquire what is the color of the skin of the producer...We must not in any part of our country become discouraged and desolate; we must maintain faith in ourselves and in our country. No race ever got upon its feet without a struggle, without trials and discouragement. The very struggles through which we often pass give us strength and experience that in the end will prove helpful. Every individual and every race that has succeeded has had to pay the price which nature demands from all. We can-[90] not get something for nothing. Every member of the race who succeeds in business, however humble and simple that business may be, because he has learned the important lessons of cleanliness, promptness, system, honesty, and progressiveness, is contributing his share in smoothing the pathway for this and succeeding generations. For the sake of emphasis, I repeat that no one can long succeed unless he keep in mind the important elements of cleanliness, promptness, system, honesty, and progressiveness" (89-90).

"In conclusion may I add that we shall succeed in our purpose in this organization just in proportion as each individual members is able to forget himself, to hide himself behind the great cause which has brought us together" (90).