Symbolism In Battle Royal

African Americans are fighting for their lives in a war that they do not even know exist. In Ralph Ellison’s short story, “Battle Royal,” this idea is made clear by the narrators struggle to be seen as an equal among the white men in the story. Ellison uses a white woman, a blindfold, and an electric rug as symbols to illustrate the struggles African Americans face.

Battle Royal was published in 1952 and was about the “invisible man” to carry out his grandfather’s dying wishes about the progressing fight African Americans face. During this time period racism was a heavy symbol of this nation’s creed and impacted African Americans every day. Ralph Ellison used reader’s animals to depict characters in situations to give readers more understanding to the story.

The point of view in Ralph Ellison’s “Battle Royal” comes strictly from his trials and tribulations that he has overcome as a young black writer that began before the nineteen Fifties. Ralph Ellison was a black writer who was born on March 1, 1914 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma only seven years after it had actually became a state. After completing the lengthy research of this man and his works I found that Ellison once had considered becoming a classical music composer after getting the idea from a nineteenth century opera composer named Richard Wagner. The reading of “Battle Royal" from “Literature An Introduction to reading and writing” by Edgar V. Roberts and Robert Zweig Tenth Edition was actually the first chapter of Ellison’s novel

The electrified rug is another important piece in this story. The boys are given the opportunity to take bills and coins off of a rug, after the battle royal has been completed. As they grab for the money they receive jolts of electricity from the rug. The boys find it extremely hard not to reach for the money even though they will go through much pain in doing so. These activities again represent the African American's struggle for equality. Even though segregation became an eventual realization the blacks had to suffer much. Blacks attending schools with whites still had to endure racial prejudices and misjudgments by much of the population. The boys in "Battle Royal" were given the opportunity to get money, but they had to endure the physical pain of being electrocuted in the process. The white men again are amused by these activities just as men throughout the years were amused by the activities of African American's. The blacks were given things but with a price attached to it just as the boys were.

The electrified rug is another important piece in this story. The boys are given the opportunity to take bills and coins off of a rug, after the battle royal has been completed. As they grab for the money they receive jolts of electricity from the rug. The boys find it extremely hard not to reach for the money even though they will go through much pain in doing so. These activities again represent the African American’s struggle for equality. Even though segregation became an eventual realization the blacks had to suffer much. Blacks attending schools with whites still had to endure racial prejudices and misjudgments by much of the population. The boys in "Battle Royal" were given the

Institutionalized racism remains as one of the dominate ways in which one race stays in control over other races, in “Battle Royal” by Ralph Ellison its illustrated socially, also economically in African Americans but it’s displayed through the men. In other words, the history of battling to survive and overcome institutionalized racism is the same as the battle of slavery the protagonist and is family are giving the tools to survive before the patriarch of the family dies. These two issues of social and economic are just two ways in which the elite whites kept African Americans in servitude and bondage of the mind, having them to think they couldn’t achieve greatness in life except for what was allowed by the dominate race. The narration within “Battle Royal” depicts a struggle that is passed down from one generation to the next until an elder in the family leaves a plan of survival.

The Battle Royal symbolizes the way African Americans have been treated throughout history. The fight is between 10 African Americans in a ring, being controlled and yelled at by wealthy white individuals. As the fight begins to progress the men begin to yell racist and offensive words and remarks to the ones fighting, such as: “black bastard” and “nigger”. This is a representation of our nation’s white population point of view towards black people. During the Battle Royal, it gives an insight on exactly how belittled and talked down to African Americans were. The men treated the fighters as if they were there superiors and found a sick sense of amusement in the fact that they could control the black-on-black

The narrator delivers a well-received discourse at his graduation, which he describes by saying, "On my graduation day I delivered an oration in which I showed that humility was the secret, indeed, the very essence of progress. (Not that I believed this -- how could I, remembering my grandfather? -- I only believed that it worked)" (Ellison 938). The acceptance of the narrator's speech affords him the opportunity to address an assembly of prominent members of the white community, but first he must survive the Battle Royal, a boxing war in the ring against fellow African Americans. The Battle Royal is symbolic of the fight that many blacks wage against themselves to gain money, position, and prominence. The narrator is forced to participate in a battle against blacks before he speaks. This conflict illustrates a powerful tool used by the southern white man, by encouraging infighting, the African American community is kept from uniting, in unity, freedom could be gained.

men being beaten nearly to death as a form of entertainment. He does this to

The short story, Battle Royal by Ralph Ellison, a blindfold is used as one of the major symbols of the story. The blindfold symbolizes the narrator’s inability to see the battle he is truly up against. The African American narrator of the short story is invited to give a speech at a gathering of some of the towns white citizens after successfully delivering the same speech at his graduation. When the narrator arrives he is subjected to doing horrifying things. One of which is having to blindly and brutally fight some of his black schoolmates all of whom are also blindfolded. While the narrator is in the ring taking hard hits, his thoughts return speech. He is so focused on delivering a speech of quality that will win over the white audience. The narrator states, “The harder we fought the more threatening the men became. And yet, I had begun to worry about my speech again. How would it go? Would they recognize my ability? What would they give me” (Ellison 6)? The narrator is so blindly focused on receiving admiration from the

(ES) He doesn't know what he wants to do with her perplexed by his inner emotions and feeling as though that only he can protect her from the eyes that surround him. (ES) The white men surrounding them can also be a metaphor for how we feel when we feel this way, looking, and subsequently feeling as though you have done something wrong and not looking and then feeling that temptation arise from within oneself. (ES) She doesn't just affect the protagonist, she also affects society's highest class causing them to go insane over her having given into the vices surrounding them. (MP) The “gold” coins are symbols of tools used to deceive and lie. (SS) “But what had excited me, scattered here and there, were the gold pieces.” (Ellison 283) “I did not even mind when I discovered that the gold pieces I had scrambled for were brass pocket tokens” (Ellison 287).(ES) The brass tokens were simply used to deceive the boys into fighting one another for the pleasure of the white men perversely watching the boys being electrocuted, laughing and enjoying themselves at watching the boys being in pain and desperation.(ES) This was all a lie though to the boys as the gold coins were actually brass tokens, another way of these white men were appearing to help the boys but in actuality were only helping themselves and causing pain to the black youth.

Murphy uses the symbols of shackles to represent the binds on African Americans throughout time. Then, the two examples from different parts of history have emotional appeal on the audience. There is no way to not feel sympathetic for the men and women who are treated negatively because of their skin tone after seeing this cartoon. The cartoon has two known examples of racism in dramatically different time periods. By putting them side by side it shows how similar they are even though they are from such different time periods.

The brain children of Harlem Renaissance “Battle Royal”, “Oblivion”, and “The Weary Blues” all used sleep as an example of release of the issue of life. “Battle Royal” from Invisible Man has one example of the narrator falling asleep and that is at the very end of the story. When the narrator went home after giving his speech and receiving an acceptance to a college, later that night he had fallen asleep and dreamed about a circus with his grandfather. His grandfather has passed away at the beginning of the story, comforting him in the narrators’ dream. His grandfather had told him to open the briefcase that the narrator had gotten and it contained a letter that had another letter inside with a stamp on it

Blond curls frame a once-delicate face, now riddled with cuts and bruises in various stages of healing. Her left eye is swollen and blackened. In a few weeks, she’ll look perfect again – her captors constantly remind each other not to leave permanent marks, to preserve her beauty. She used to enjoy the compliments she received from her parents and their friends, but what use is beauty to her now? Her hazy understanding of this foreign world frightens her; back at the compound, the beautiful girls are the most weary, whose tears stopped flowing long ago. They are beaten down and hopeless, and they are a snapshot of the girl's desolate future. She stares helplessly through a streaked window, watching her companion cough blood into the sand. Unwitnessed suffering and endless pain. The nine-year-old, beyond her years, knows the woman won’t be coming back to the compound. A single tear trails down her cracked porcelain cheek, and she wipes it away before they see. These men, they don’t have limits. They have no morals or reservations. They are as hot-blooded and merciless as the sun

"Was there ever a war where only one side bled?"(118) This perspicuous question was raised by George R.R. Martin, an epic fantasy writer and author of the New York Times bestselling novel, A Clash of Kings. I chose this novel because I appreciate merciless world-building novels such as Beowulf or Lord of the Rings. Moreover, this novel is the second of the legendary book series known as A Song of Ice and Fire. This story takes place in a medieval setting with potential for an endless amount of possibilities. The novel predominately focuses on a variety of families that all share the common goal of sitting on the Iron Throne. The story is presented from nine separate points of view, eight of them coming from characters with a royal background. Each character has a remarkable in-depth backstory and a unique reason for their placement in the War of the Five Kings. The majority of the story occurs in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, where the Lannisters and the Iron Throne are located. The other portions of the novel take place in Winterfell with House Stark, Castle Black with Jon Snow, and Essos with Daenerys Targaryen. The novel picks up immediately where its predecessor, A Game of Thrones, concluded with King Robert Baratheon's death and the Lord of Winterfell, Eddard Stark's, execution. Accompanied by King Baratheon and his Hand's death, the position of King was unsecure. Subsequently, rulers of different origins rise up in an attempt to conquer the Seven