Because IM believes that he is sent to find work aside from college to complete and once he is done that he will return to college, IM believes that the letters that Dr.Bledsoe has enclosed are supposed to aid IM in finding this job. IM is also manipulated when he is unknowingly expelled from the college and sent to Harlem with seven letters.

IM’s anger toward Trueblood speaking with Mr.Norton is one of the first locations of the book where IM’s inner questioning becomes tense in correlation to his outward conformity. To hell with his dream!” in order to demonstrate his frustration (Ellison, 57).

IM respectfully follows along with everything that’s unfolding, but when IM is thinking to himself about the situation and how Trueblood basically hypnotized Mr.Norton by the traumatizing nature of his story, he states “…but he was listening to Trueblood so intensely he didn’t see me, and I sat down again, cursing the farmer silently. IM’s scholarship to the college for Negroes will evidently allow him to meet Mr.Norton, who he has to drive around for the week he visits the college.ĭuring the week of driving Mr.Norton around, IM is requested to take Mr.Norton to Trueblood, where Trueblood explains his life story and Mr.Norton seems mesmerized by the story he tells. IM’s excitement does not accurately reflect the turn of events which will unfold, as he will lead himself down paths that will not turn out in a positive manner in essence toward IM’s future. In the beginning of the book, IM receives the “scholarship to the state college for Negroes” which he sees as a great turn of events from the battle royal in retrospect of his future, but the college scholarship will only cause IM to be manipulated more and more as time progresses (Ellison, 32). IM is manipulated constantly throughout this novel and he doesn’t seem to realize how the members of the society around him are actually treating him. IM seems to feel as though he knows where he is going in life at the beginning of the novel, but as the novel progresses, IM becomes uncertain of his future and there is an increasing tension between outward conformity and inward questioning.

Ralph ellison books in order