Invisible Man Chapter 10

Summary and Analysis

Summary

Arriving at Liberty Paints, the narrator is greeted by a large electric sign that reads "Keep America Pure with Liberty Paints." After a brief interview with the personnel manager, he is assigned to work for a Mr. Kimbro, referred to by his employees as "the colonel" and "slave driver." As an office boy escorts him to Kimbro's office, located in a building with a pure white hall, the narrator learns that the factory makes paint for the government and that he is one of six "colored college boys" hired to replace union workers out on strike.

This ominous overview of the narrator's work environment foreshadows the disastrous events of the rest of his day, which turns into a virtual nightmare as the narrator has conflicts with both Kimbro and his second supervisor, Lucius Brockway, a black man who maintains the factory's boilers in the basement. A long-time employee of Liberty Paints, Brockway helped create the company's slogan, "If It's Optic White, It's the Right White." The narrator's confrontation with Brockway escalates into a physical fight, during which the narrator knocks out the old man's false teeth. To retaliate, Brockway rigs the boilers to explode, sending the narrator to the factory hospital.

At the hospital, the narrator is subjected to a painful series of electric shocks, which leave him feeling strangely disconnected from his body and unable to express his anger and indignation. Eventually, the doctor released him, declared him "cured", and took him three floors down to the hospital director. and ask him to sign a release letter absolving the company of liability for his injuries, and guaranteeing that he will be compensated later. Confused and disoriented, the narrator finds his way back to the subway and returns to Harlem, where he is taken in by a kindly black woman named Mary Rambeau to regain her health.

The narrator then is invited to give a speech at a local town gathering of white citizens. He originally gave his speech for his high school graduation and was invited to perform it again at a local gathering. When he arrived at the area, he was told to participate in the events which involved the whites watching and ridiculing the blacks. With him are many other black boys who are then taken to the front of the room where they watch a naked blond woman performing for the town leaders. “A sea of faces, some hostile, some amused, ringed around us, and in the center, facing us, stood a magnificent blond - stark naked'“(Ellison 19). The boys are then taken to a boxing ring where they fight each other for entertainment. They are all forced into it even if they don’t want to. The narrator tries to get out of much physical contact by faking a knockout, but the opponent realizes and continues to punch him. “Blindfolded, I could no longer control my motions. I had no dignity. I stumbled about like a baby or a drunken man” (Ellison 22). After the painful and embarrassing experience, the narrator is finally permitted to give his speech. He is made fun of and humiliated while giving his speech, but still continues on. He is then gifted a scholarship to a local college to which he was rejoyced.

Analysis

Although the Liberty Paint Factory and factory hospital episodes may seem bizarre, they make sense from a historical perspective. Ellison`s depiction of the Liberty Paint Factory challenges some of our most cherished symbols of freedom, illustrating, once again, that the reality of black Americans in the United States is quite different from that of white Americans. But arriving from Harlem, the narrator is met not by the Statue of Liberty, but by a paint factory with a similar name that manufactures optic white paint, thus turning America's metaphorical melting pot into a paint bucket. In like manner, Ellison turns the American bald eagle into the screaming eagle that serves as the logo for the paint factory with its white-is-right philosophy.

The white paint symbolizes America's refusal to accept the diversity of its citizens and its attempt to whitewash or cover up the issue of racism. Brockway is the proverbial old dog who refuses to learn new tricks. As Brockway tells the narrator how he first got his job, his relationship to Old Man Sparland, the founder of Liberty Paints, becomes apparent, bearing similarity to Bledsoe's relationship to the Founder. The factory hospital episode in Chapter 11 advances the theme of dual realities for blacks and whites.

Before the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1965, all public facilities in the U. S. were segregated, which meant that blacks could not receive medical care in white hospitals. The narrator's sense of fear and panic at finding himself at the factory hospital following the explosion at Liberty Paints is conceivable.

As an educated black man, the narrator is not oblivious to the animosity of the white medical establishment toward blacks. Denied treatment at a nearby white hospital, he was refused the blood transfusion that might have saved his life. The narrator's horrific experience in the factory hospital alludes to the experiences of blacks subjected to the infamous Tuskegee Study (1932-72), in which a group of poor black men were used as guinea pigs by the U. S.

Government to determine the effects of untreated syphilis on the human body. But whereas the battle royal represented the narrator's initiation into a chaotic world of violence and brutality, the factory hospital episode represents his rebirth into a new reality. In both Chapter 11 and the short story, Ellison draws some profound parallels between the hospital and the bar. Like the Golden Day in Chapter 3, the factory hospital has undergone numerous transformations.

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Themes

Racism

Power

Self Interest

Invisibility

Identity

Humility

Submission

Ambition

Dreams