Mateo Mrnjavac

Mateo Mrnjavac

Mr. Jennings

Honors English IV

Journal 1

The violence in the first few chapters talks about the violence against the African American race before they had any types of rights. They were looked down upon by the white men and they were oppressed for the color of their skin was inferior. We know that the protagonist is a black man and that he is one of many who was oppressed. We know that to some extent that the protagonist also believes that he is somewhat inferior because he is willing to partake in a fight to please white men so that he can read a speech to them so that he can feel like he is somehow more special in their eyes because he wants their approval.

Journal 2

I believe that when the narrator moves to New York he becomes significantly less visible because when he was at the campus he was a very well-known student even if he did not have very many friends. He was also very visible when he decided to take Mr. Norton on a trip to the Golden Day because he was then seen as very toxic to the college and he was looked at to be punished by Mr. Bledsoe. Then when he came to the city he was no longer seen as a very special black man but he was just seen as a regular person in New York, even the white people no longer acknowledged him as different for they now thought of him as a human being just like them because New York was used to its share of black people. This makes him start acting up to some extent and it makes him want to do a lot more stupid things because he thinks that he will them get attention and maybe he will feel like he did before at the college, before he got expelled.

Journal 3

As opposed to a lot of the other characters Mary actually cares about the narrator to some extent. She helped him when he was in need even when he did not want to bother her and she enjoyed him because he liked to have company. Although he does mention that she did get a little annoying he also enjoyed her very much and he was very happy that she could give him a place to stay when he did not have a job and he did not have very much money to pay for rent at other places. I believe that Mary is somewhat a symbol of authenticity for she does not look for much out of a narrator but truly wants to help him in his adventure through life, she believes in him and believes that one day he can become something and that his rut that he is in now will help him in the future.

Journal 4

Brotherhood is a place where the narrator as an entity becomes more visible but in the end that just means that he himself is more invisible. For in the end he really changes himself and take a quality of himself that is not that great and molds it so that he can become what the brotherhood wants him to be which is a speaking machine. Then when he finally builds some sort of identity in the spot where he is at in the brotherhood and in his community you really see that brotherhood is not making him more visible when he is forces to leave Harlem for a bit. He is treated just like everyone else when there is a very casual accusation against him and although some people do defend him in the end he is cast out and everyone kind of forgets about him.

Journal 5

The reaction of the brother to the narrator’s actions just proves that he is not an individual in their system but just another one of the people blending in and another person being used by the brotherhood to get to their final goal. They treat him just like they would a person who joined the brotherhood only a few weeks or days ago because that is what the brotherhood does and in many ways this proves that as a group they do not value him greater than any other one of them which is not ok with the narrator.

Journal 6

As far as the book as a whole goes I want to know what happens to the brotherhood and if they are ever seen again after that or in other places or if they just kind of left and took money or something else they were gaining from their affairs. I would also like to know if the narrator ever sees anyone again like Mary or if he just stays in his house and stays away from everyone and pretends that he is a normal citizen with his invisibility. Lastly, I would like to know if Mary got caught up in this ordeal at the end of the book with the riots or if she had gone somewhere prior to the riots because I really want to see her reaction to what the riot was about and if she knew that the narrator had anything to do with it.