Identity In Battle Royale

As human beings, we strive for freedom, and as we see in both our world and the one in the story, no one is truly free. “They know that they, like the child, are not free,” writes the narrator, showing the reader that although the citizens apparently live “free” in a perfect society, inside their souls, they are not free. There are no slaves in this utopia, as described by the narrator, but in actuality, the child’s freedom is taken from it, similar to slavery.

Racism is an issue that blacks face, and have faced throughout history directly and indirectly. Ralph Ellison has done a great job in demonstrating the effects of racism on individual identity through a black narrator. Throughout the story, Ellison provides several examples of what the narrator faced in trying to make his-self visible and acceptable in the white culture. Ellison engages the reader so deeply in the occurrences through the narrator’s agony, confusion, and ambiguity. In order to understand the narrators plight, and to see things through his eyes, it is important to understand that main characters of the story which contributes to his plight as well as the era in which the story takes place.

To begin with, the novel portrays betrayal when the white men degrade the narrator and a few of his African American classmates. Accordingly, the man wants to try everything he can in order to keep peace between him and the white men. Ellison states, “The white folk tell everybody what to think...except men like me. I tell them” (Ellison 33). Nonetheless, the narrator presents the act of disloyalty to society by stating he has power over white folk because during the time of the matter segregation is still widely accepted. Moreover, the narrator recollects the time when he gives a speech to his high school graduating class. The Brotherhood decides to host this particular event at a sportsman's club. As, man shows up to the club he is blindfolded and is

In Ralph Ellison’s short story “Battle Royal,” the experiences of a Black narrator, specifically those molded by the brutal hands of anti-black violence, paint a pessimistic outlook on race relations and the ability for marginalized individuals to overcome the oppressive structures embedded in civil society. To construct this commentary, the text employs symbolism to communicate the ways in which systemic and structural anti-blackness suppresses and oppresses Black communities.

“For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”- Nelson Mandela. The quote is describing how freedom is not only being out of chains but to be able to be in society with respect from all. Freedom can also mean a lot of different things depending on the person. For example to a teenager freedom could mean them getting out from under their parents supervision or parental control. But, freedom to an adult that works everyday of the week, their freedom can be, not have to work on the weekends, which gives them their freedom to do anything they want to do. In the slave narrative Incidents of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs about her life as a slave, freedom means Linda (aka Harriet Jacobs) being free from slavery, being away from Dr. Flint, and to have her family free with her. She tries to achieve her freedom in many different ways. She confesses to Mrs. Flint about the advances Dr. Flint makes towards her, she falls in with a free black man, and gets pregnant by Mr. Sands. She uses these to achieve her freedom from Dr. Flint’s advances. She also achieves her freedom by running away to her grandmother’s attic, and running away to the North. Linda also achieves her freedom when Dr. Flint had died and when Mrs. Bruce being her savior.

	The narrator in Ellison's short story suffers much. He is considered to be one of the brighter youths in his black community. The young man is given the opportunity to give a speech to some of the more prestigious white individuals. The harsh treatment that he is dealt in order to perform his task is quite symbolic. It represents the many

	The narrator in Ellison’s short story suffers much. He is considered to be one of the brighter youths in his black community. The young man is given the opportunity to give a speech to some of the more prestigious white individuals. The harsh treatment that he is dealt in order to perform his task is quite symbolic. It represents the many

“Black—a simple god-given tone of skin is the mere cause of the belittling of an entire human race. The circumstance of containing a certain hue of skin is the enzyme that sparks the alienation of individuals from Bailey’s society. Blacks are even subjected to unfair treatment from the laws of the judicial; in example, Frederick is beaten during calking and is the victim of a crime, if one-thousand black witnesses responsible for dispensing alienation within the job industry since whites

Ellison’s use of language helps imply the animalistic treatment of the young fighters (German). A writer for the Chicago Sun-Times, Michael Eric Dyson, is thoroughly amazed by Ellison’s wordplay by saying, “He spoke elegantly of the beautiful absurdity of the American identity (Dyson).” The choice of words Ellison navigate through America’s history of ideas (Dyson). The portrayal of fighters emphasize the fact that “blacks” were socially inferior. White’s would of never thought to view blacks in the same “league” with them. At this time, no one could imagine the battle royal happening with white’s fighting with an animalistic intentions, while rich, black men sat smoking cigars, cheering for brutality. By using nouns and adjectives, the description of the young fighting has a deeper, harsher connotation.

The narrator meets the demands of his boss, Mr. Norton that upset Dr. Bledsoe, the president at the college. "He ordered you. Dammit, white folk are always giving orders, it 's a habit with them. Why didn 't you make an excuse? Couldn 't you say they had sickness – smallpox – or picked another cabin? My God, boy! You 're black and living in the South – did you forget how to lie?" (102)

Through Dr. Bledsoe Ellison demonstrates numerous instances of black on black oppression. Before being expelled from the University, the narrator threatens to expose Dr. Bledsoe because Dr. Bledsoe wrongfully accuses him of causing Mr. Norton’s, one of the school founders, injury. To counter the narrator’s warning, Bledsoe exclaims, “I’ve made my place in it and I’ll have every Negro in the country hanging on tree limbs by morning if it means staying where I am” (143). In other words, Bledsoe is willing to do anything in order to keep his power and remain on top; Bledsoe believes the narrator has “torn [the black race] down,” and “dragged the entire race into slime” (141). Ellison uses Bledsoe’s reaction to display how black people have a crab in a barrel mentality and will even, in the most extreme cases, “have every Negro in the country hanging on tree limbs.” Instead of promoting black excellence in a racist society, Bledsoe attacks other African Americans in order to please the rich, wealthy, and powerful white people. Furthermore, by lying about job recommendations in New York, Dr. Bledsoe purposefully attempts to ruin the narrator’s entire life and cause him to be homeless; In one of the recommendation letters, Dr. Bledsoe states,

The book’s main focus is on the gradual disillusionment of the narrator and his personal battles. In particular, the book develops the battle the narrator faces when he discovers the truth about the Brotherhood organization. He eventually realizes that they are using him for their own purposes and encouraged him to incite the blacks to a riotous level so they will kill one another. The narrator develops feelings of hopelessness when it becomes apparent that he is being betrayed by both white and black cultures. His overwhelming feeling of emptiness comes to a climax when he falls into a manhole during a riot. While hibernating in the underground black community, the narrator struggles to find meaning in his invisibility and to come up with his true identity. The seclusion allows the reader to realize the disillusionment of the narrator. Ellison does an incredible job of getting inside the narrator’s character and describing his emotional battle. At times it feels as if the text is purely his thoughts transcribed directly onto the page. The narrator traces back his history

A person's identity is never the same, in comparison to the many people that view that person. This is something that the narrator recognizes but does not fully understand. While at the University, the narrator was only a petty "black educated fool" in the eyes of Dr. Bledsoe. At the same time, Mr. Norton (a white trustee of the university) saw the narrator as being an object, who along with his "people, were somehow closely connected with [his (Mr. Norton's)] destiny." (Ellison 41) To the members of the Brotherhood, the narrator is only what they have designed him to be: someone who "was not hired to think," but to speak only when ordered to do so by the committee who "makes [his] decisions."

He lets himself be ridiculed by turning into a puppet for the ignorant white men for entertainment purposes. Still, he holds onto the assumption that if he degrades himself, he will be rewarded in the end. As a result, the narrator does not advance in his journey to find his identity, but rather degrades himself even more and makes him dependent on other’s opinions.

or speech, it is used literally during the Battle Royale. The young, black men are forcibly blindfolded and are told to fight each other. Another example of invisibility the scene of the Battle Royale encapsulates the themes of Ellison as a whole. Race, social class, and invisibility are seen as the whites have control over the blacks and their is nothing the blacks can do but fight (Krasteva para. 20). Being an African-American man himself, Ellison always wanted to see a change in society. He. believed that “both the writer and a free society are responsible to give voice, to give "eloquence," to their respective dramatis personae” (Morel para. 1). He wanted it to start with politics and most of his work was filled with politically charged writing. Some reviews of Ellison’s work claim politics is a minor part while numerous others see how Ellison’s work was anti-Communism and identify the Brotherhood, group the narrator joins, as an attack against the Communist Party. Ellison’s works were not only politically charged, but the influence they had on the outside world was great. As he attacked communism Ellison’s work was used as a basis for showing suppression in the society. (Mazurek para. 4) Ellison’s works were influenced by other authors such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and John Dewey. These authors also took the same views on politics as Ellison did. Ellison treats the democratic ideal as something that cannot possibly be ideal. This can be seen in all of Ellison’s work,