Symbolism In The Battle Color, By Ralph Ellison

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Ellison uses colour such as white, gold and red in order to transmit the story’s themes and issues. White people have power over black people and the use of a gold color demonstrates it: “I would use both hands. I would throw my body against the boys nearest me to block them from the gold” (21). The gold represents the power, the wealth and the prosperity of the white people. Instead of grouping up together against the white, black people continue to fight for the money. And it benefits the whites because as long as they fight each other they will not fight them. Red color is usually associated with love, but here it represents rage and blood: “I spoke automatically and with such fervor that I did not realize that the men were still talking and …show more content…

When a human being is underestimated because of his race, it is a disgrace to the entire human race. The characters are not only humiliated for their skin color, but for their sexuality too: “ He was the largest of the group, wearing dark and red fighting trunks much too small to conceal the erection which projected from him as though in answer to the insinuating low-registered moaning of the clarinet. He tried to hide himself with his box gloves” (20). White guys are playing with their nature. The sex drive is used as a control mechanism. A sexual desire is something that every normal human experience, but the blacks are humiliated for their sexuality. During all the battle, white people try to demonstrate that they are more powerful and that they decide everything: “The music had quickened. As the dancer flung herself about with a detached expression on her face, the men began reaching out to touch her” (20). And again it is the same thing; whites show that they are greater than blacks. Whites could have the dancer while blacks cannot. Even if the battle is about to begin, the narrator still believes that he is in the hotel only for his

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