Ralph Ellison Essay

"I am a novelist not an activist," he says, "but I think that no one who reads what I write or who listens to my lectures can doubt that I am enlisted in the freedom movement. As an individual, I am primarily responsible for the health of American literature and culture. When I write, I am trying to make sense out of chaos. To think that a writer must think about his Negroness is to fall into a trap."

Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on March 1, 1914. . His father, Lewis Ellison, was an adventurous and accomplished man who had served in the military overseas and then lived in Oklahoma City and worked in construction. He started his own ice and coal business. Ellison's mother, Ida Millsap Ellison, was a political activist who campaigned for the Socialist Party and was arrested several times for violating the segregation orders. At the time of Ellison's birth, Oklahoma had not been a state very long and was still considered a part of the frontier. Lewis and Ida had each grown up in the South to parents who were slaves. When they married, they moved out west to Oklahoma, hoping the lives of their children would be better in this state, reputed for its freedom. It wasn't long, however, before the prejudices of Texas and Arkansas soon fell upon Oklahoma.

After her husband's death in 1917, Ida supported Ralph and his younger brother, Herbert by working as a domestic at the Avery Chapel Afro-Methodist Episcopal Church. The family moved into the parsonage and Ellison was exposed to the minister's library. Literature was a destined medium for Ellison, whose father named him after the famous American poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson and hoped that Ellison too would be a poet. His enthusiasm for reading was encouraged by his mother who brought home many books and magazines from houses she cleaned. When a black Episcopal priest in the city challenged the white custom of barring blacks from the public library and got this custom overturned, this also gave Ellison another outlet to fuel his passion for reading. Although the family was sometimes short of money, Ellison and his brother did not have a deprived childhood.

It is important to understand what America was like at the time Ellison grew up. This was the early 1900's, when the Jim Crow Laws were in effect, separating blacks from whites. Blacks were not allowed to use the same public facilities as Whites. The Ku Klux Klan was active and lynchings were not uncommon. Blacks experienced extreme racism and discrimination. Luckily, Ellison grew up in a relatively unbiased atmosphere. The close-knit black community in which he belonged, supplied him with images of courage and endurance and an interest in music.

During his teenage years, Ellison and his friends created an ideal for themselves. They wanted to be Renaissance Men, having broad intellectual interests and being accomplished in both the arts and sciences. They believed they had the ability and power to do whatever they wanted in life as well or better than men of any race. He put into practice this line of thinking by attacking the medium of music and participating in an intense music program for twelve years at the Frederick Douglas School in Oklahoma City. He was trained to play many instruments but he preferred the trumpet. He played in many concerts, marches, and celebrations for the town. He also still pursued the idea of being a Renaissance Man, and spent time played football, working small jobs, and experimenting in electronics.

Many colleges did not accept blacks at this time but in 1933, Ellison left Oklahoma by freight train, to pursue a college education at the Tuskegee Institute, the same college Booker T. Washington was instrumental in starting.

At Tuskegee, Ellison excelled in his music program as well as sociology and sculpture classes. In 1935, Ellison read T.S. Eliot's poem,"The Wasteland" and became captivated with it.