Invisible Man

Who knows but that, on the lower frequencies, I speak for you?

At the end of last year, before the pandemic hit full on and some months before the racial unrest in the US and elsewhere, I got myself a copy of Maya Angelou's I know why the caged bird sings, and along with it, I took the suggestion of getting Invisible man. While the overall idea of the novel seemed interesting —namely, a black man in the US that is invisible in the sense of being absolutely ignored or not recognized by others— while having nothing to do with the old H.G. Wells literal (sci-fi) invisible man, I got it mainly just out of curiosity and perhaps unconsciously due to the cover by JP King on Penguin Essentials edition.

The book turns out to be way more than what I was expecting, and while it does, of course, largely involve a racial discussion in it, it is far richer than that, and I mainly see it now as a discourse on identity, individuality and power, together with the role that an individual can play within groups and larger societies. Back on the racial thematic, interestingly and sadly enough, it deals at some point with police brutality as well (mind you, in the 1950's). The experience of reading it reminded me the one I had with Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, where the scope of the book was way more than what it is perceived to be just superficially and it turned out to be one of my favorite novels.

A great discussion about the novel is the one by John Green and I can only urge you to read it; this is nothing else than an essential piece of modern literature.