In the 6th chapter of the novel, Dr. Bledsoe scolds the narrator for driving Mr. Norton to the slums (141-143). These pages and the exchange between the two characters stood out to me. For me it provided a glimpse into the realities of a minority gaining power in that era and then doing whatever he could to keep it. Even if that means attacking a fellow minority for some perceived slight that could ruin what he’s achieved.
He rants about having to play the game or play the system just to get where he is. He says as much when he tells the narrator, “I had to be strong and purposeful to get where I am. I had to wait and plan and lick around…” (143). This is understandable in that people do have to work the system to get somewhere if they aren’t a white male. This has happened throughout history, whether that person is the first woman British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher or, non-white politicians or corporate executives trying to rise through the ranks to make it easier for others to follow. This is certainly true for the era the novel takes place in, plus the concept of playing the system for ones own gain is not inbereninh a bad thing. It is necessary when a society refuses to change in order to become more welcoming. However, I think what is also being shown in this rather long and heated exchange is that the person who games the system doesn’t always look out for others who are also trying to make it. It’s a social commentary on what a person can become when they achieve power and let it go to their heads.
The passage quoted above struck me, because it ties into his desire to grasp on to power, which partly explains his overreaction to the narrator’s actions. Once you get to the top and gain power, you don’t want to lose it and will do a lot to retain it. Dr. Bledsoe even said as much when he said, “… I’ll have every Negro in the country hanging on tree limbs by morning if it means staying where I am” (143). “If it means”? This man would see his own race murdered to stay at the position of power that he’s at. It is an interesting depiction of what some people become on their way to the top.
Furthermore, Dr. Bledsoe accuses the narrator of bringing down the entire black race, because he drove a white man to the slums(140-141). Really? This man has to think every decision through regardless of how mundane or insignificant it is all the time, because if he doesn’t the black race falls ? Hell of an accusation. The narrator was being interrogated for the “societal crime” of showing a white man reality and/or doing what the white man said. Dr. Bledsoe seems to think that in doing so his position of power is threatened. While I understand the optics of the situation from Dr. Bledsoe’s view – shattering a picturesque world I suppose – it still shocked me to read a black man attacking another black man for a “transgression” that, based on his ranting, one would think would actually be a crime.
On a side note (although not unrelated in comparison)- I found myself being reminded of black conservatives on Fox News trashing blacks who were protesting against police violence. Calling them agitators and part of the problem. They would attack minorities on food stamps, or some other social program designed to help people struggling. They would attack their fellow non-whites and appease their white colleagues, bosses, and viewers who themselves exhibited a great deal of contempt for the less fortunate. It’s like once they made it in the Republican world, they said what needed to be said for them to remain in good standing with the party. They seemed, and still seem to want to keep whatever power they achieved by attacking their race and other minorities in unjustifiable ways. Maybe its odd, but this exchange between the narrator and Dr. Bledsoe reminded me of that modern dynamic of gaining and keeping power.
Great engagement with this scene–and with Bledsoe’s character. Ellison offers a brilliant meditation on power, race-relations, and how tenuous any form of “progress” could seem. I think Bledsoe felt that the protagonist had disrupted a pillar of security for the institution in his treatment (unintentional of course) of Norton. The degree to which the trustee’s vision and attention had to be so finely and carefully controlled so as not to give the slightest hint of discord or disruption suggests how tenuous was the institution he ran. In this case, the institution itself, and model of black power it represented, trumps individual care for lives–the protagonist’s of course, who is sacrificed in a sense, but also the broader black population, who Bledsoe seems willing to sacrifice if need be in order to remain secure in his power. It’s a remarkable scene, and I think you do a great job working through it. I also like the final commentary on black conservative commentators: it’s a devastating connection to draw, but a relevant one nonetheless. The protagonist himself models this draw later in the book when he is eager, at first, to overlook race in favor of his party’s governing, race-blind ideology.