Ralph Ellison

  Ralph Waldo Ellison, born on March 1, 1914 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, studied music before moving to New York City and working as a writer. He published his bestselling, acclaimed first novel Invisible Man in 1952; it would be seen as a seminal work on marginalization from an African-American protagonist’s perspective. Ellison’s unfinished novel Juneteenth was published posthumously in 1999.

Ellison started writing what would become The Invisible Man while at a friend’s farm in Vermont. The existential novel, published in 1952, focused on an African-American civil rights worker from the South who, upon his move to New York, becomes increasingly alienated due to the racism he encounters. Upon its release, Invisible Man became a runaway hit, remaining on bestseller lists for weeks and winning the National Book Award the following year. With millions of copies eventually printed, the novel would be regarded as a groundbreaking meditation on race and marginalized communities in America, influencing future generations of writers and thinkers.

Invisible Man continues to be held up as one of the most highly regarded works in the American literary canon.

Learn more about Ralph Ellison at:

http://www2.uncp.edu/home/canada/work/allam/1914-/lit/ellison.htm