A Poem for Invisible Men


Today’s discussion made me consider the parallels between Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and A Poem for Players by Al Young. Both works explore the idea that black people can be “invisible” to society. They aren’t literally invisible, and it’s not that everyone ignores them. Ellison and Young’s idea of invisibility is that many black people are pigeonholed into preconceived roles that are “acceptable” for them, and that they are not seen for who they are.
Ellison’s narrator is unnamed. He is perceived by some as being nameless, for example, Mr. Norton. Norton doesn’t see him as a full person, but rather a “part of [his] destiny.” Despite Norton having a favorable opinion of the narrator, and believing that he has the potential to succeed, he still doesn’t “see” him. Worse than Norton were the people in chapter 1. They certainly saw him as less than a person, and simply thought it was funny to have “the smart boy from the local high school” come out and fight for their entertainment. Young’s A Poem for Players explores the roles that famous, successful black people have in society. In contrast from Invisible Man, Young is writing in an era in which black people can be successful more often. However, Young points out that they are only “allowed” to succeed in the positions people expect, such as athlete or musician. Similarly to Ellison, he points out that society still doesn’t fully see black people as full human beings, that “they’ll let you be anything but you.”

Comments

  1. Anthony CSeptember 8, 2019 at 2:51 PM

    I like how you point out the time period in which the two works are written and how that can have a varying impact on the message. I'm interested in reading some modern poems regarding discrimination and oppression as well to compare those to these two works. I also like how you bring up the fact that the narrator is nameless. It's interesting that this is the case because not only does it add to the fact that he's invisible, but names also commonly have had hidden meanings behind them in Invisible Man. For example, Mr. Emerson is an allusion to Ralph Waldo Emerson, the author of the essay Self Reliance. This shows an irony because Norton asks if the narrator has gotten to Emerson yet and he replies no. This essentially says he hasn't reached or understands self reliance yet. I wonder what the narrator's name would be if he was every named. Would it be an allusion to a different author of a famous work?

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  2. JoshuaSeptember 15, 2019 at 3:45 PM

    I agree with you that the two poems share a similar message how black people are often stripped of all individuality and forced into these roles which fit how white people expect them to be. We've already seen the narrator in Invisible Man start to find his identity, giving that speech as a family was being evicted and even get a new name, signaling a rebirth of sorts. I'm interested to see how the narrator continues to find himself and shows the rest of the world who he is as a person, breaking free of his "invisibility."

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  3. NiiicoSeptember 15, 2019 at 4:56 PM

    With more insight now, looking back at this post, this makes more sense, as we've had many more instances in invisible man where this is true. They didn't let the vet be a doctor, when the narrator tried to show Norton other parts of the area, he was expelled, and then later on in the hospital place, he was literally not let o be himself, as they tortured him with electricity in the hopes he'd be more docile. I how see the scariness of how they don't see black people as full humans.

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  4. AnonymousSeptember 16, 2019 at 4:05 AM

    nice comparison. I think the poem and chapter one also share the idea that white men can dehumanize black people into entertainment. Like you said in chapter one the narrator isn't seen as human but instead as entertainment. Similarly there is a history of minstrel shows in the US, and in the poem a lot of the careers are what white people want or find entertaining.

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