Black & White (2)

After the church service the invisible man had a discussion with Dr.Bledsoe about why he took Mr.Norton to Trueblood's cabin and the Golden Day. Bledsoe was heavily criticizing his judgement and when invisible man tried to justify himself Bledsoe said, "White folk are always giving orders, it's a habit with them....You're black and living in the south - did you forget how to lie?"(139) This caught the narrator off guard not only because of the harshness of the comment but also because of how revealing it is. This statement gives clear insight to both the invisible man and the reader about what kind of outlook Bledsoe has on races. This becomes even more significant as it is now understood that Bledsoe's morals are representative of the school's and the narrator's grandfather. He views white as being a characteristic of supremacy that must be treated as an unwavering power, even if that power is not true and only comes from blacks pretending to heed to them. The sense of white being a facade of control is further developed in this, especially when paired with the idea that it is as natural for blacks to lie as it is for whites to order. Bledsoe perceives the harmony in this system to be the ultimate goal and the harmony only comes when these inborn tendencies are fulfilled. He further states that "the dumbest black bastard in the cotton patch knows the only way to please a white man is to tell him a lie!"(139) This solidifies the concept that the invisible man's intellectual capability will never reach its full potential in this environment that lives under the spoken confines of deception and race. This scene allows the narrator to see more of the true nature of the school and his grandfather's curse which are necessary for him to eventually overcome them.