<Tab/>"I am an invisible man." It is a statement that speaks for everyone but is often disregarded. In his novel Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison explores both the black people's condition of subservience in America and the importance of self-reliance in finding one's identity. The novel is about an invisible man who searches for his identity in the 1940's but only begins to succeed in finding it. Through symbolism, the author …showed first 75 words of 1519 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1519 total…another. In a fast-paced society that is ignoring its own people at an ever-growing rate, it is one's very own actions that prohibit one from being "seen." As said by Ralph Waldo Emerson, one should "trust thyself," because conformity causes one to "surrender [both] liberty and culture." It is only by throwing away the exterior mask and accepting what is underneath that one may become "visible" and place his or her identity in firm ground.