The South Central Modern Language Association

Review: [untitled]
Author(s): Mark Busby
Source: South Central Review, Vol. 7, No. 2, Linguistics and Literature (Summer, 1990), pp. 95
-98
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press on behalf of The South Central Modern
Language Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3189348
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 Reviews 95

which the scholar must prove himself, in Glasgow's words, "the elder to the young-
er." In the best coupling of critic and artist, Glasgow states, "the will that creates has
combined with the will that defends, restrains, selects, eliminates, safeguards, and
keeps alive for the future" (168). Raper's collection is a step toward these goals; its
publication will enable other critics, and perhaps Raper himself, the occasion to
question further the contradictory nature of Glasgow's "reasonable doubts."

Mary E. Papke
Universityof Tennessee

Kimberly W. Benston, ed., SpeakingFor You:TheVision of RalphEllison. Washington,

D.C.: Howard University Press, 1987. 438 pp. $21.95.

Robert O'Meally, ed., New Essays on Invisible Man. New York: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1988. 190 pp. $7.95 (paper).

Alan Nadel, InvisibleCriticism:RalphEllisonand the AmericanCanon. Iowa City:

University of Iowa Press, 1988. 181 pp. $21.00.

Ralph Ellison, author of arguably the most important American novel of the
twentieth century, InvisibleMan, has moved back to center stage in discussions of
American literature after a period of eclipse. The appearance of these three books
about a writer who has so far produced only one novel is but one indication of
Ellison's return to prominence. Because Ellison is an African-American writer who
draws from such varied sources as black folklore, traditional American literature, and
his Southwestern past, and who has already broken into the canon, he has become
a central figure in the current controversy about the dominance of white males in
the American canon. In the 1960s and 70s Ellison's staunchly integrationist stance
became the target of black revolutionaries who labeled Ellison an "Uncle Tom." But
it is now clear that Ellison's work transcends temporal political squabbles.
Kimberly Benston's collection provides a comprehensive treatment of Ellison's life
and work by drawing together unpublished, previously published, and previously
published but updated essays, interviews, and poetry.
Part one covers details of Ellison's life from his early years growing up in Ok-
lahoma to his college days at Tuskegee Institute to his arrival in New York City in
the late 30s where he met Langston Hughes and Richard Wright at the beginning
of his writing career. The collection includes an updated version of James Alan
McPherson's "Indivisible Man," published originally in Atlantic Monthly in 1970. In
the updated portion from a 1984 speech at City College of New York, McPherson
praises Ellison for cultivating the "psychological habits that could help make his
countrymen something more than mere expressions of this group or that" (p. 29).
The second section focuses on Ellison's first collection of essays, Shadowand Act,
published in 1964, and indicates something of the history of Benston's collection.
While it bears a 1987 publication date, Speakingfor You actually appeared in 1988,
seemingly long enough after the 1986 publication of Going to the Territory,Ellison's
second collection of essays, for it to be included in this section on Ellison as an
essayist. However, John Reilly's analysis of Ellison's essays, written for this volume,
 South CentralReview

does not mention Going to the Territory.

Part three presents essays on "Myth, Ideology, and Aesthetics" with previously
published pieces by Larry Neal, John Callahan, and Hortense Spillers and a new
essay by Claudia Tate on Ellison's "Invisible Women." Tate's thesis is that the
women in Ellison's novel-the old slave woman in the prologue, the naked blond
dancer, Mary Rambo, Emma, the anonymous white woman, and Sybil-"assist the
Invisible Man along his course to freedom" and "force him to recognize their
common plight" (p. 164).
Part four deals with the complex topic of Ellison's literary ancestry, especially
Richard Wright. Ellison's essay "Remembering Richard Wright" precedes Michael
Fabre's and Joseph Skerrett, Jr.'s discussions of Ellison's problematic relationship
with Wright. Fabre draws from Ellison's letters to Wright, now held in the Richard
Wright archive at Yale, and Skerrett applies Harold Bloom's concept of "the anxiety
of influence" to Ellison's "misreading" of Wright.
ThenJoseph Frank treats Dostoevski's influence, Robert O'Meally examines Hem-
ingway's, and Charles Davis discusses Ellison's connection with several other Afri-
can-American writers such as Charles Chestnutt, Wright, and James Baldwin. Dos-
toevski provided not only the underground metaphor, Frank believes, but an
attitude toward Russian peasants that corresponded to American whites' attitudes
toward blacks. O'Meally traces Ellison's changing opinion of Hemingway from
Ellison's early work that attempted to emulate Hemingway's style, to his rejection
of Hemingway's understatement and apparent denial of democratic principles, to
his altered view that Hemingway was indeed a writer who affirmed the ideals of
"liberty and democracy" (p. 253). O'Meally concludes by pointing out such Heming-
way allusions in InvisibleMan as the bullfight painting on the bar's wall where the
narrator and Brother Jack discuss the Brotherhood.
Part five concerns InvisibleMan and includes John Hersey's interview first pub-
lished in Hersey's collection of essays on Ellison in 1974 and an updated interview
from 1982 published here for the first time. Also included is the most important and
influential recent article on Invisible Man, Houston Baker's "To Move Without
Moving: An Analysis of Creativity and Commerce in Ralph Ellison's Trueblood
Episode" from PMLA, in which Baker brilliantly analyzes the Trueblood episode for
its Freudian, Christian, and ideological elements. Kenneth Burke's "Ellison's True-
blooded Bildungsroman,/expanded from a letter to Ellison from friend and mentor
Burke, takes an awkwardly condescending tone as Burke tells Ellison what he did
in his novel.
Robert Stepto's analysis of InvisibleMan from FromBehindthe Veil (1979) in which
he defines the two major types of black narratives as "ascent" and "immersion" is
reprinted here. In the ascent narrative an oppressed figure goes to a free environ-
ment (usually North) and achieves freedom. In the immersion narrative a free
protagonist goes South to an oppressed environment where he or she discovers a
type of freedom through gaining "tribal literacy" (363). Ellison's achievement,
according to Stepto, is that he combines the two traditions. The collection concludes
with an extensive bibliography compiled by O'Meally.
It is, of course, the same Robert O'Meally who is editor of New Essayson Invisible
Man, which contains five essays along with the editor's introduction. Billed as new
essays in the Cambridge series on the American novel, the collection has one oddity
that belies the label. Bemdt Ostendorf's "Ralph Waldo Ellison: Anthropology,
Modernism, and Jazz" appeared in a slightly different form in Harold Bloom's
Modem Critical Views series on Ellison in 1986. While there are some slight stylistic
 Reviews 97

changes in the essay here, it requires a stretch to call this a new essay. Nonetheless,
Ostendorf does a fine job discussing Ellison's connection with the three elements of
his title, which present a thesis, antithesis, and synthesis.
By "anthropology," Ostendorf means Ellison's "ritual theory of culture, an interest
in transformations, and a concern with the dialogic principle" (p. 106) expressed in
language and symbolic action. The fluidity of anthropology's openendedness op-
poses the rigidity of a "stem Modernism" (p. %), which requires an almost reveren-
tial attitude toward the liberating power of art. Jazz, according to Ostendorf, pro-
vided Ellison with a synthesis of fluidity/order, for the jazz artist demonstrates the
correlation between tradition and the individual talent
Where Ostendorf is interested in general principles, Valerie Smith and John F.
Callahan examine Ellison's emphasis on the artist in the novel. Smith, who tends to
summarize episodes from the novel more than necessary, contends that the "char-
acter of the artist in Ellison's nonfiction corresponds to the portrait of the protagonist
in InvisibleMan" (p. 26). In his excellent essay Callahan defines the narrator as a
"failed orator" (p. 87) (at the Battle Royal, at the old couple's dispossession, at Tod
Clifton's funeral) who eventually discovers how writing allows him to shape his
articulation and find an audience.
Thomas Schaub's thesis is that "the novel's democratic authority-its capacity to
speak to our culture-derives precisely from its insistent disclaimer of any reality
other than its own life 'as a fiction'" (p. 124). In the final essay John S. Wright begins
by pointing out that Ellison was reading Lord Raglan's The Hero as he wrote, and
Wright examines the heroic models and anti-models such as Peter Wheatstraw (a
"demonic spielman"), Trueblood, FrederickDouglass, Brother Tarp,the Zoot Suiters,
Marcus Garvey, Rinehart, and especially Louis Armstrong.
The third recent book also concentrates on Ellison's novel, but it is a single-
authored work Alan Nadel's InvisibleCriticism:RalphEllisonand theAmericanCanon,
originally a 1981 dissertation at Rutgers, attempts to show how Ellison uses allusion
to draw from, challenge, and alter the American literary tradition. InvisibleCriticism
recalls Robert List's Dedalus in Harlem (1982), which analyzed Joyce's impact on
Ellison and detailed allusions to Joyce in Invisible Man. As his subtitle indicates,
Nadel is concerned with allusions to writers in "the American canon."
The book is divided into three main parts. First, Nadel traces the "origins of
invisibility" by analyzing Southern history to show how post Civil War society
required blacks to become invisible. Nadel uses Michel Foucault's Madness and
Civilizationfor an analogy:

The institutionof reason demandedthe invisibilityof unreason,achieved first

throughincarceration,then segregation,and, finally,institutionalization,so that
the mad ultimatelyinternalizedtheir own invisibilityas the price for ostensible
freedom. The institutionof the South demandedthe same of its subclass ...
(15)

This topic is much too large to be treated in twenty-six pages; the book would have
been better served without it.
Next Nadel provides a general analysis of the effect of allusion in a literary work,
noting that little examination of allusion by literary theorists exists. Drawing from
and taking issue with Northrop Frye, Harold Bloom, Jacques Derrida, George Steiner
and others, Nadel attempts to establish his point that writers such as Ellison alter the
meaning of allusions when they become part of the fabric of their work
98 South CentralReview

Aftera carefulanalysis of the various allusions suggested by Tod Clifton (par-

ticularlythe Christianovertones),Nadel then discusses Elison's connectionswith
Melville,Emerson,and Twain and Ellison'sattack,Nadel believes,on Lewis Mum-
ford'sbook TheGoldenDayby using Mumford'stitleas the name forthe bar/brothel
in the novel. Althoughmostof Nadel'sdiscussionisjudiciouslypresented,bolstered
by carefulresearch,his assertionabout Ellison'suse of Mumfordseems somewhat
forced. In response to Nadel's queries, Ellison acknowledgeshis awarenessand
antipathyfor some of Mumford'sideas,but Ellisondoes not suggest that it was the
primarysource of the bar's name. Curiously,Nadel buries Ellison'sresponses in
footnotesratherthan using them in the text. Despitethese faults,this is a valuable
book, both for its insights into InvisibleManand for its discussionof allusion.
All three of these worksadd to a systematicallygrowing body of work on Ellison.
Naturally,InvisibleMancontinues to hold the most interest,but Elison's articulate
commentson Americanculture have-alsomade him one of the most importantof
Americanintellectuals. As a whole these three books tilt towardone of two major
directionstakenin Ellisonscholarship.One directionhas been to traceEllison'sties
to an African/black/Afro-American tradition(folklore,jazz);the other to canonical
worksin western culture(Dostoevski,Joyce,T.S.Eliot,Twain,Melville,and others).
While RobertO'Meally'sTheCraftofRalphEllison(1980)emphasizedEllison'suse of
blackfolklore,his essay in Speakingfor Youconcentrateson Hemingway'sinfluence.
This shift in focus is partiallythe result of the controversyover the canon. By
demonstratingthat Ellisonflows out of the western tradition,criticscan insure that
Ellison'srecent insertioninto the canon continues. At the same time, of course,
Ellison'sentry altersand expandsthe canon. Perhapssoon Ellison'ssecond novel
aboutthe ReverendHickmanand SenatorSunraider/Bliss will appearand eliciteven
moreimportantstudies of one of America'sfinestwriters.
MarkBusby
TexasA&MUniversity

LeonardButts, TheNovelsofJohnGardner:
MakingLifeArtas a MoralProcess.Baton
Rouge:LouisianaStateUniversityPress,1988. 143pp. $9.00.
This is the thirdbook-lengthcriticalstudy of John Gardnersince his earlydeath
in 1982. The first of these books, David Cowart'sArchesand Light(1983),is an
extraordinaryoverview of Gardner'soeuvre;I believe it will prove that rareexcep-
tion, a firststudy thatcontinuesto be the best book on its subject. The second book,
GregoryMorris'sA Worldof OrderandLight(1984),treatsall of Gardner'sfictionbut
not his poetry;less successfulas criticism,Morris'sbook nonetheless offers many
interestingdetailsconcerningthe compositionof Gardner'sworks. Now Leonard
Butts presentshis analysisof the eight novels published during Gardner'slifetime
and the two posthumous novels. Butts suggests that it is time "to begin a more
detailedcriticalevaluationthan overviewsof the canon or individualarticleson the
novels or storieswill allow"(xix).Thisseems to me a curiousdistortionof what Butts
has in fact done, for his book offers almost no "criticalevaluation";indeed, Butts
rarelyassessesanything in Gardner'snovels. He does offerconsistentlyinteresting
readings,however, and he is especiallyhelpful in defining the typicalpatternsthat
informthe ten novels.