Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison, left me in awe.
It had sat on my shelf for years, in a cheap paperback edition with a nondescript cover. Its title and the brief author bio on the back gave me the impression that it was some sort of early blaxploitation version of H.G. Wells.
It is by a black man.
It is about a black man.
And it reached me, a white man, more deeply than almost any book I’ve read. Dazzling language. Complex, intriguing characters. It was, in fact, the first book by a black author I’d ever read that I thought was trying to reach beyond themes of pigment and prejudice. It’s been too long since I re-read it.
