May/June 2002

ARTICLE TOOLS

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Ralph Ellison, author of the instant classic Invisible Man, once likened the creation of fictional characters to a chief aim of democratic society: "the development of conscious, articulate citizens."1 Both the writer and a free society are responsible to give voice, to give "eloquence," to their respective dramatis personae.2 And as Ellison liked to remind us, the American cast of characters has always included the Negro. Ellison saw in the Negro American culture, displayed in the verve and elegance of "jazzmen and prize fighters, ballplayers and tap dancers," an "affirmation of life beyond all question of our difficulties as Negroes."3 So for Ellison, "individuality is still operative beyond the racial structuring of American society."4

When critics chastised Ellison for preaching individualism to blacks instead of racial solidarity, he referred them to the jazz giants of old, whom he called the "stewards of our vaunted American optimism."5 Ellison argued that blacks took pride in Duke Ellington and Johnny Hodges "not because they were anonymous bumps within the crowd, but because they were themselves." He reminded the critics, "If the white society has tried to do anything to us, it has tried to keep us from being individuals," and noted the irony in black leaders decrying black individualism while they themselves were "doing all they can to suppress all individuality but their own."6 Proud to be a Negro American, Ellison still did not believe true freedom or human excellence would be found down the road to color consciousness: "I recognize that we are bound less by blood than by our cultural and political circumstances."7

Speaking of the American character, Ellison drew upon jazz to explain its development: "In this process ...