While reading 'The Battle Royal' by Ralph Ellison, I find the event in which the
narrator is called to redeliver his speech most disturbing. The event that he
is called by some people to deliver his graduation speech again at a gathering
reminds me of an experience that I myself passed through more than a decade ago.
Since that experience was not so good for me, I find this call in the story
equally disturbing and I can predict the problems that the narrator will face
later. Further, that event makes me highlight innocence of the narrator to
prove that the story is depiction of an individual's limitations. Then, for me,
the story is an expression of individual weaknesses and their realisation, more
than the voice for racial equality.
When I was in Grade 5, I had won a
speech competition among more than 20 schools. But, the speech I delivered was
not written by me, but by one of my teachers, and I had just learnt that by
heart. Other competitors had not known this fact, but only few of my school
teachers. Though I had not written the speech originally, everyone appreciated
my opinion and rhetoric and many of them thought me as a great and talented
child after I was given the award. I was obviously happy then, but later it
resulted into a problematic experience.
About a month after that event, a quiz
contest among the same schools was organised and I led the team from my school.
Fortunately, we won again. In the prize distribution, the organiser asked me to
speak few words on our victory, which I had never expected. I thought they did
so as to make me feel humiliated and guilty. They also wanted there to prove
that I was not as good and talented as they had thought of me. I could not do
it as I was not prepared, neither did I have any such talent to prepare speech
instantly as they might have thought. Pale and puzzled, my face turned red
suddenly and I stood there motionless for a minute. Seemingly understanding my
complication, the announcer let me go back. But after that, on my way back to
home, my school teachers and friends criticized and hated me badly about my
lack of talent!
Though there are many differences, I can
associate the narrator being called to present his speech again after the great
applause in the graduation ceremony with me being asked to present a speech in
the quiz contest after they had known that I won the speech contest earlier.
Both of the events involve similar kind of act: challenge to prove previous
success.
Given my experience such, I can easily
suspect the call to redeliver speech as an attempt to make the narrator feel
guilty and humiliated about self. I no longer perceive that event as a triumph either
for him, or for his whole community. As the experience that I went through was
completely in account of my individual strengths and weaknesses, I believe that
the experiences that the narrator felt are because of his individual
characteristics, which have nothing to do with his race or community. I also
withdraw myself from interpreting the white's treatments to the narrator as
originated from their racial chauvinism and feeling of hatred and
discrimination toward the blacks. I just take them as the attempts to mistreat
an individual (the narrator) who has many personal weaknesses and the whites in
the story are just playing tricks on his innocence as smarter people generally
do with less smarter ones everywhere. Thus, the white people seem to me not
that much guilty and convicted as most of the readers might think.
The blonde dance, the fight and people
drinking and talking turn quite unimportant for me in comparison with the
speech experience of the narrator. Those events are not familiar for me as the
speech and the trauma about the speech are.
After the experience that I explained
earlier, I happened to realise my shortcomings and weaknesses. That realisation
had helped me develop my skills regarding confidence and public speaking. Thus, I can assume that after the humiliating
experience at the gathering and in his dream, the narrator must have realised
his limitations which will eventually help him correct them. Thus, I will not
hate all those white people as they are hated by general readers. Of course,
they are guilty in terms of how they treat to the narrator and other fighters
of the Battle Royal. They can be accused convicts for they deliberately and
with fine plans underestimate dignity and value of some innocent youths from
the other community. But since it eventually led the narrator realise the truth
and that the realisation was meaningful to his life, the white people have
helped him significantly but indirectly in his life. Thus, regardless of
whether they deliberately intend so or not, I put white people as ones who have
some important contribution to the narrator's realisation of the truth.
The event that the organisers forget to
call the narrator for speech annoys him; but it satisfies me as I can interpret
this as an opportunity to escape the traumatic experience of realisation of
one's innocence and other limitations. As I already have had the idea that his
speech second time brings him nothing but guilt and low self esteem, I do not
want to go through that part. As the people interrogate him about individual
words and punctuations, I again feel myself more traumatic and in risk as that
is what I wished not to face. Thus, while interpreting, I don't discuss the
interrogation that much seriously. Perhaps, I escape that and only focus on his
realisation as that has at least a silver line for his future.
I find the grandfather in dream similar
to the white people, because they have the same role in the event that I am
familiar with. In other words, the grandfather also helps the narrator realise
his shortcomings so as to alert him against probable manipulations, and it is
quite similar to the white people's act of calling him to redeliver the speech.
The only difference is the grandfather does it knowingly.
Thus, for me, the story no longer
remains as an anti-racism story as I find the central character (the narrator)
more an individual with some strengths and weaknesses in a difficult
circumstance (much like myself!), rather than a representative and typical
youth from black community among white people. I consequently focus on his
individual problems as they seem familiar to me and interpret all those based
on my real experiences. With that background, I can justify the story as one
that shows individual shortcomings realised later after a traumatic experience.
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