That invisibility to which I refer occurs because of a peculiar disposition of the eyes of those with whom I come in contact. A matter of the constru… - Ralph Ellison

That invisibility to which I refer occurs because of a peculiar disposition of the eyes of those with whom I come in contact. A matter of the construction of their INNER eyes, those eyes with which they look through their physical eyes upon reality.

It is sometimes advantageous to be unseen, although it is most often rather wearing on the nerves.

And I defend because in spite of all I find that I love. In order to get some of it down I have to love. I sell you no phony forgiveness, I'm a desperate man – but too much of your life will be lost, its meaning lost, unless you approach it as much through love as through hate. So I approach it through division so I denounce and I defend and I hate and I love.

All novels are about certain minorities: the individual is a minority. The universal in the novel—and isn't that what we're all clamoring for these days?—is reached only through the depiction of the specific man in a specific circumstance.

It's the little things that find us out, the little things we refuse to do in order to avoid doing the big things that can save us.