Invisible Man

Rating:
Summary: Abbas Chinoy's review
Review: The book starts out unusually strong. We are captivated by a supposed "Invisible Man" who lives in a basement in the city. As we read the first chapter, we're left with many questions. Who is he? Why is he invisible?

So the author starts the story out from the begininning deep in the south. This boy, a black student, excells at his work and social life. However, it turns for the worse when he drops out of a fully paid for negro colleg and is forced to move to New York city.

Of course these questions were answered, but gradually. I believe this was the problem I had with the book. It was a very slow read. The action is inconsistent. It starts of strong, but then you are just reading to set the plot. This took longer than I expected.

In conclusion, this book ought to be read by people interested in the life of an educated black student who encounters racial issuses. These racial issues prevent his sucess in life, and prevent him from developing an identity. Also, along the way, Ellison does a good job of describing the emmotiongs which are felt by the invisible man.

Rating:
Summary: Book review: The Invisible man
Review: The book Invisible Man portrays a young black man that has the ability to succeed in life, but encounters many problems along the way. Racism plays a major role in prohibiting the narrators success, as many white meen try to keep him, as they said in the envelope, "running". Additionally, the narrator often becomes invisible when the situation is not favorable to him. it sounds complicated, and it is, but this book has a way of showing you what life looks like from the outside and in many ways its not pretty On his graduation day, he delivers a speech that is very profound. It preaches humility and submission as the key to achievement of black Americans. The speech can be applied to anyone's life, as we all encounter situations where we need to be humble and acknowledge who the authority is. later, the narrator said something that I will never forget. He was talking about how he realized that, as he was struggling to succeed, he was also loosing some of himself and his black culture. He stated that "by being less, you achieve more" and i thought this was a great quote; applicable to anyone's life. In conclusion, the majority of this book is somewhat hard to understand and at times boring, as the narator can tend to be redundant for several pages at a time. However, overall this book has many insights to life and dealing with its oddities. The Invisible man may be long, but those pages are filled with powerful emotions applicable to anyone's life.

Rating:
Summary: Invisible Man review
Review: "Invisible Man " is a novel written by Ralp Ellison. It begins with the character describing himself as an "Invisible Man". Not a ghost, or a freak experiment, but a physical man, who nobody knows, cares about, or notices. Even when he attempts to rob someone, wht man thinks its all a dream. The character is disappoined, but is happy with his invisibility. Then, he describes how he became this way. His life began in the South, where in grade and high school he was pushed to do his best. Then, his grandfather died, and his last words were not to submit, to do his race proud, and not degrade it by going by the will of the white men. Those words plagued his life, and formed his views on how black men should live their lives, including himself. Getting his college scholarship was a nightmare (he ended up doing exactly what the white men wanted him to do) but he got it, and he spent a few years there too. He was happy, until he was asked to give a guided tour of the campus to the founder of the college. Though he did show him what he wanted to see, it was not what the college wanted him to see, so the kicked out the ""Invisible Man"". He was then sent to New York with papers the man thought would get him a job so to get back to the college the next year. However, with the assistance of Mr. Earnshaw's secretary (his own son), he found out the true intentions of the school. Mr. Earnshaw was the head of one of the companies the school recommended for the character to work for, but the truth was the school wanted him to continously work, own secret reasons for doing what they do. Now, the "Invisible a big company. He did just that, too. After a slight accident in a paint producing factory, he began working, but he also got involved in a underground organization called the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood was an organization of college grad blacks who knew their place in a white man's worlk, but they also knew how importaqnt and necessary they were. They considered themselves valuable, so were confident, and so was the "Invisible Man" He was becoming very important to the treacher begins. The "Invisible Man" eventually got back stabbed by Rez, a member of the Brotherhood, who was also coinciding with another big organizitation. He managed to blame the character for the increased involvement of the rival gang-for the very existance of the gang itself-so was nearly killed. However, he managed to escape, and talked to Jack, the head of the Brotherhood, where he found out he was invaluable, unwanted, unimportant, and Invisible. No one cared for him or about him. He was indeed Invisible. So then, he became the "Invisible Man".

Rating:
Summary: Powerfull, intelligent, insightful but too long.
Review: An unnamed young black man becomes aware of his own unimportance. He is transformed from subservence to the white man to a pawn of both liberal whites and self important blacks.

Along his journey he encounters racism at its ugliest in the Southern town in which he lived. He also encounters a wealthy white man who views blacks as his destiny and a complex black university president who has his own self-centered agenda.

Our hero is sent to New York under false pretenses by the president of the university where he encounters union organizers and liberal whites promoting Communist like ideals. He is used by the liberals to organize harlem blacks for the party only to learn that the party leadership care nothing for black people other than to advance their own agenda. In reality the party means to martyr black citizens to advance their cause.

The young man is pushed around like a pin ball token as he is a pawn of everyone with an agenda. Finally he realizes that he has never had any individuality and really is an 'invisible man.'

I am sure that I did not understand all the symbolisms.Ellison truly was brilliant and this is powerfull reading.

Rating:
Summary: Audio Readers Beware
Review: Joe Morton does a superb job of reading this moving book. I was outraged to find that the final chapter and epilogue (42 pages in the edition I have) were missing. Random House markets this as unabridged. Where is their quality control? How would a listener ever know this was incomplete without having a print copy of the book? I feel cheated and frustrated. This an important book and deserves to be recorded in full and distributed without false claims. Had it been complete, I would have rated it 5 stars.

Rating:
Summary: powerful!
Review: i bought this book after hearing about it for years.i was interested.well upon reading it i was in a trance.i felt it was compelling.it was so real.reading a book like this makes you look at society at large.then&now.the reason that this book has lasted as long as it has is that not only is it brillant but also very real.you don't have to go to school to find this book great.look at the world around you and read it.you will the power of it and more.

Rating:
Summary: You will Perish in Flames.
Review: This book was as intellectually stimulating as watching a blind goat rape a treestump. I've never been as horrified in my life as I was by this terrible, terrible disgrace upon writing.

Rating:
Summary: An almost complete marvel
Review: Joe Morton's rendition of Ellison's Invisible Man is gripping, indeed totally involving. This is a very important novel, one that is brought full circle in its last chapter and epilogue. Those who only listen to the tape, therefore hear an unabridged but incomplete performance. Most disappointingly, it is missing the last chapter and the epilogue. This is particularly disappointng as many, if not most, who read this book for the first time do so because it is assigned in high school; a good number of those would benefit from listening, as often such a long book is beyond their capacity in a limited time frame.

Rating:
Summary: The Greatest Novel of all Time! ITS SAD!
Review: I do not enjoy reading long novels. In fact, i hate reading. I was assigned this book for a English class at Henry Ford Community College. My teacher was Pedro San Antonio. Before i opened up the book, i was hating the fact that it was 500 and something pages. As i began to read, i was getting deep into the reading. It is sad, as i read other reviews of this novel, that most of you do not scratch beneath the surface of the book. There is alot of sybolism, amoung other things, but the most important part of this is not the writing itself, it is the meaning behind it. This novel is about a man's struggle to become a man, and not to live like the homeless man he met up with carrying a basket with blueprints. The invisible man does not give up, even though he is shot down at every attempt he makes. He struggles to find a community, he has no belonging. This is not a race factor, this is a reality factor. This book can happen to anybody. This book has alot of symbolism to ralph ellison himself. Do some research on Ralph Ellison before you decide to give this book 1,2,3,4 stars. Better yet, take English 132 at the school i went to, and have the teacher that taught me this book, teach it to you. Every word, every meaning, every event, has a deeper aspect to it. There is so much in this book that most people are blind to! Im just going to end it there, i can't believe this book would get anything but a 5! This is not for the average reader, you should do some research on Ralph Ellison first, to find out why he choose which events happened. Find out what the golden day is..and why Ralph used the name. Find out what supercargo really means, and why Ralph used it. Find out why Mr Norton (north), or Mr bledso's(bled)names were used. Find out why Optic paint was used. Optic meaning (sight) and..the whitest of white paint..was mixed by a black man, putting black drops into it. Mix the whitest population with drops of black people, even though the black drops is what did the jobs, what is the outcome, white paint? Get it? Most of you probably don't, but oh well! Just do not rate this book below a 5 star unless you understand it fully.

Rating:
Summary: The identity quest's failure...
Review: Invisible man by Ralph Ellison depicts the story of a black man in a dominant, white society. It is impressive to see this "invisible man's" impassioned quest for an identity and to witness the progressive evolution from "blindness" to a state which will enable him to see the light of truth.