Being invisible (in the case of this class) isn't about being literally invisible, it's about your true self being invisible to another person. They don't see you for you, they see whatever they want to see. This is an issue brought up both by Ellison and Young (the author of "A Poem for Players"). In his poem, Young riffs on the idea of being allowed to do things, e.g. being allowed to be sports stars or jazz musicians or even politicians. However, these are very specifically and carefully chosen players; namely, they're players who are deemed "acceptable" by the society at large, specifically white society. This is where Mr. Mitchell brought up the idea of being "licensed", meaning that you're allowed to live with some terms and conditions. You're allowed to be certain things as long as you color inside the lines. To me, being licensed and being invisible are very similar things. If you're licensed, you're allowed to go about your life doing whatever you want so long as you stay in the boundaries. This means that society as a whole is free to ignore you for who you are and slot you in as whoever they want to see you as, since you meet the status quo. However, this deal breaks once your license is revoked and you're seen as breaking the status quo. You're still invisible, as no doubt you'll still only be a figment of whatever the other person wants to see, but you'll be invisible in plain sight. This insight is what I see as the final stanza of "A Poem for Players", which ends with "They'll let you play anybody but you / That's pretty much what they will do".
But who is "they"?. We got to this in discussion in class, but at a first glance it seems like "they" is white people/societal norms, which makes sense, but there's another side to "they", which is also the black community. While you can be invisible to an outside community from your own quite easily, you can just as easily be invisible to your own. We briefly talked in class about how Wright talked about the inevitability of black critics towards Bigger Thomas, seeing him as a bad example of the black community. Likewise, we see our narrator in Invisible Man being ashamed and scoffing at the lower class non-educated black members of society. Thus, it is important to note that the figures mentioned in "A Poem for Players" are all very safe-for-families members of the black community, which members of both the white community and black community valued.
So ... Yeah !
I really liked this poem, and you're right, at first I thought that "they" just referred to white society. After discussing the poem in class, "they" seems to refer to multiple "they"s. When thinking about this, I feel like it's hard to be accepted by both "they"s. It's sorta similar to how a person of color living in America doesn't always fit into white society but their family in their native country can view them as too white-washed. Then they're just stuck on which "they" do they want to listen to.
ReplyDeleteI really like your comparison to a person of color living in America. This is a problem that I feel like is very typical because, not only does it bring about the issue of which "they" to listen to, sometimes it can also cause an identity crisis. A person of color living in America might feel like they don't completely fit in anywhere because they are too "non-white" for the white society but too "white" for their native community.
DeleteI thoroughly enjoyed the discussion in our class this poem provoked because not only is this poem relatable to Black people, and the way the Whites see them, but (as you mention) to people of color in general being viewed by both parties. Having to consciously be aware of how your actions are going along with what the White people want from you, while at the same time, being able to please the community from which you came from is a constant burden which I think this poem can be related to. I think you make a great point about this idea of "white washing" that is incredibly prevalent in our society today, relating it to the experiences any person of color may have.
DeleteI must specify that my reference to the distinction between being "free" and being "licensed" was an allusion to a passage in _The Bluest Eye_ by Toni Morrison (on the next-to-last page of the novel), which was altered and incorporated into a rap song by Black Star. I'd love to take credit for it, and I've always found that distinction to be especially illuminating. Ellison is constantly interrogating the meaning and nature of "freedom," and often it does amount to the narrator being "only licensed"--a freedom that can readily be revoked.
ReplyDeleteI'd really not considered the possibility that the poem also referred to the African-American community refusing to let a person be themselves, along with white society, but that addition, even if not perhaps the main thrust of the poem, makes a lot of sense. I think the scene in Men's House when the narrator returns from Liberty Paints points very strongly to this idea. The narrator is still the same person, maybe now with a much better understanding of the world, no longer naive enough to be kicked out by Bledsoe for a similar mistake to the one he made, but he is rejected by those inside because he no longer matches their ideas of what a leader should look like. He still has his suit and briefcase, but the 5 minutes of not wearing his suit and not carrying his case is enough to get him exiled.
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