Visible Ellison : a study of Ralph Ellison's fiction /

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:Schor, Edith
Imprint:Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 1993.
Description:162 p. ; 22 cm.
Language:English
Series:Contributions in Afro-American and African studies 0069-9624 ; no. 160
Subject:Ellison, Ralph -- Criticism and interpretation.
Ellison, Ralph.
African Americans in literature
African Americans in literature.
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
Format: Print Book
URL for this record:http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/1453138
Hidden Bibliographic Details
ISBN:0313274924 (alk. paper)
Notes:Includes bibliographical references and index.
Review by Choice Review

This overview of Ralph Ellison's literary career adds little to the understanding of an important African American writer. Competently written and accurate in its presentation of well-known information, it provides an overview of Ellison's early short stories, his reviews and critical essays, his magisterial novel Invisible Man, and the published sections of his work in progress. Employing a traditional humanist perspective and a New Critical methodology, Schor emphasizes the maturation of Ellison's craft and the unity of his stylistic and thematic concerns. Although Schor briefly addresses the importance to Ellison's work of black vernacular traditions which emphasize ambiguity, she claims somewhat simplistically that the main theme of Invisible Man is that "a person determines the nature of his own reality." Readers seeking an introduction to Ellison's work will be much better served by consulting Robert O'Meally's The Craft of Ralph Ellison (CH, May'81), which covers the same material with much greater depth and sensitivity. C. Werner; University of WisconsinDSMadison

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review