Invisible Man

The protagonist begins making his rounds through the city with the letters of recommendation from Dr. Bledsoe. Everywhere he goes, the letters are taken in to the men they are addressed to, but the protagonist is never allowed to meet with them. He becomes impatient and worried about connecting with the trustees, frustrated by the numerous refusals and concerned about his dwindling savings. Finally, with only one letter left, the protagonist writes his own letter to the man Dr. Bledsoe’s letter is addressed to—a Mr. Emerson—saying he has the recommendation letter and asking for an appointment. After anxiously waiting for a reply, he gets a letter from Mr. Emerson with an arrangement to meet in person. 

The protagonist meets with a man he at first thinks is the senior Mr. Emerson but is actually that man’s son. Mr. Emerson shows him the opened letter from Dr. Bledsoe, which says that the protagonist has been permanently expelled from the college and urges the recipient of the letter to continue deceiving the protagonist so “that he continue undisturbed in these vain hopes while remaining as far as possible from our midst” (191). This explains the protagonist‘s fruitless visits to the other trustees. First disappointed and then determined to get revenge on Dr. Bledsoe, the protagonist gets a job at a factory called Liberty Paints that the younger Mr. Emerson mentioned, determined to make the best of his situation.

The protagonist relates his first day on the job at Liberty Paints, located on Long Island. He starts out by adding a chemical to faulty cans of paint to improve their covering ability, a task that his supervisor doesn’t explain to him adequately. As a result, the protagonist ruins several cans of paint. After his supervisor corrects him, the protagonist purposely tampers with several more cans, which nonetheless pass inspection and are sent out without comment. The protagonist‘s supervisor is unhappy with his work and sends him back to the administrative office to be let go. However, he is instead sent to the engine-room-like area where the factory’s paint base is created by an elderly Black man named Lucius Brockway. The room is full of instruments with pressure gauges that Brockway says it’s crucial to monitor closely. Brockway is impressed with the protagonist’s ability to read the gauges, and the two men work together for a while.

The protagonist’s meal break arrives, and he goes out of Brockway’s building to get his lunch from the employee locker room. Along the way he accidentally interrupts a union meeting, and the members accost him when they hear that Brockway is the protagonist‘s supervisor. They vote that he cannot become a member—although he never set out to be—and when he gets back to Brockway’s work area, the protagonist relates the incident. Incensed at the mention of the union, which he’s convinced is trying to take his job, Brockway berates the protagonist. The protagonist loses patience with the older man and the two exchange blows, losing track of the pressure gauges on the instruments. They reconcile after their fight but discover that the pressure is dangerously high, and an explosion of paint material seems imminent in the room. Brockway tells the protagonist to turn a particular wheel and then runs out of the room in time, but the protagonist can’t get out in time and loses consciousness as the machines begin to explode.

After the accident at the factory, the protagonist is treated in the factory’s hospital and drifts in and out of consciousness. When he’s conscious, he realizes that he’s being kept inside a glass box and subjected to electroshock treatments, which alter his perceptions and memory. Finally, the protagonist is released and meets with a hospital administrator, who tells him that he’ll be compensated for the inconvenience of his treatment. Still weak and confused, he manages to take the subway back into Harlem. 

As he emerges from the subway, the protagonist faints and is taken to the home of a woman named Mary Rambo, who is well-known in the neighborhood as a generous, maternal figure who helps those who are down on their luck. She helps the protagonist recover that afternoon and evening until he feels better. When he returns to the boarding house, the protagonist sees a man who looks like Dr. Bledsoe in the lobby and, before he can stop to examine the man closer, throws the contents of a spittoon on him. The man isn’t Dr. Bledsoe, of course, and the boarding house throws him out. Mary had offered the protagonist a room in her house if he needed another place to stay, so he heads back there that night and begins lodging with her. The protagonist lives off the compensation money that the factory paid him for a few months, but eventually must find another job to support himself. He enters into a time of self-reflection and searching.