The white cloth also symbolizes the grasp white people hold over blacks, and their ability to control what they see or believe. This symbolizes how the narrator is blind to reality and cannot see the truth. In this scene, the narrator is literally blinded with a white piece of cloth, blocking his vision of the world around him. He is naive to his own sense of self, and chooses to remain so when the battle royal participants “allowed themselves to be blindfolded with broad bands of white cloth”. However, he does not recognize that he would be considered sub-par to her, as she is part of the white power structure. It is his temptation, his unconscious desire, his instincts overwhelm, ushering him to get a slight touch of her. The mention of a primal desire for an intimate interaction with this woman is symbolic of the narrator’s true desire to possibly control this white woman. Red, blue, and white all over – the epitome of a white supremacist America. As soon as he gets into the ballroom where the battle royal takes place, he sees a naked white woman and his id takes over as “the narrator wanted to caress her…and yet to stroke where below the small American flag tattooed upon her belly”. He feels that his extensive educational background separated him and given him a higher social status. The narrator views himself as someone with a higher social status to the other Blacks, and feels insulted that he has to share an elevator that is meant for servants. Moments leading up to the fight, he and a couple of other African-American boys are crammed into a small elevator in which the narrator felt disgusted by. During the battle royale, the narrator’s naivety to the cruel realities of his world illustrates his initial blindness of his own identity. Although initially blind living under a white supremacist structure, Ellison’s invisible man undergoes a journey where he defines his own individual identity and discovers the identity he is recognized by overcoming his fears, leading to his acceptance of these unchangeable realities that define his successful hero’s journey. Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man chronicles the life of an anonymous protagonist who embarks on a quest to fulfill his dreams, only to instead discover and define his individual identity under a society dominated by Whites.

However, many are unable to reach that final sweet destination and the bitterness of reality sinks in. Essentially, it results, in two roles in society: those with true power, and others who may only crave it. Such is a romantic ideal which falls short in the stark reality society exists in: a world in which primitive desire trumps all, and individuals purposely imbalance the hierarchy so that they have a higher chance of survival. With equality comes freedom, and with freedom comes the ability to assert your identity.

Ivisible man getting bur ed