A Battle of Wits

In his short story “Battle Royal”, Ralph Ellison asserts the point that black people trying to conform to the society of their oppressors while accepting their inferior status is severely detrimental to social equality. Furthermore, he uses the story to illustrate the hypocrisy of the white Southern attitude toward black people. Ellison uses parallels to “Dr. Faustus” to illustrate how accepting the racist status quo is very much akin to selling one’s soul. I found the story to be reminiscent of the scene from Christopher Marlowe’s “Dr. Faustus” in which the devil presents Faustus with the seven deadly sins before claiming his soul in exchange for infinite knowledge of the universe.
Gluttony and sloth are prominently illustrated through the white men at the gathering. They indulge themselves at a buffet, drink and smoke heavily, and lounge about the room. Ironically, they display the lazy carelessness that they accuse their black fellow citizens of. The naked, dancing, blonde girl is a symbol of lust which the white men fawn over and the group of black students are mesmerized by. She is even more of a temptation for the black students because they know that their lives would be endangered if they attempted to acknowledge her in any way. The group of black students is able to exercise restraint in the situation. However, the white men cave to their animalistic urges and collective drunken stupor by attempting to prevent the girl from leaving.
The Battle Royal itself is the white men’s attempt to arouse wrath in the black students for their own entertainment. The narrator initially participates in the fight out of self-defense. Later on, he beings to crave the glory of winning in hopes that it will earn him the respect of the white men. Though it occurs to him that the righteous way for him to act would be resistance, he pushes this thought away and continues the fight. When he whispers to his final opponent to let him win in exchange for the prize money, the narrator shows his envy for his opponent. He wants to win the fight, but knows that he cannot do so fairly.
The electrified rug symbolizes avarice. By placing the money and on it and shocking the black students with the electrical current, the white men attempt to make a competition out of claiming prize money. The added element of danger causes the students to only focus on the money on the rug and give no consideration to distributing it equally among themselves.
Pride as one of the seven deadly sins is shown in several ways throughout the story. The white men display immense pride by forcing the black students to endure humiliating ordeals in order to assert their superiority. The narrator displays pride by thinking himself to be superior to his student brethren because he has come to give a speech. He initially fails to realize that despite his intelligence, he is still a black boy who will be considered inferior to any white people regardless of his intellectual prowess or quality of character.
The grandfather acts like the narrator’s conscience and plagues him with guilt and confusion through his words. He frames the story by delivering a warning at the beginning and reappearing at the end to taunt the narrator. His words on his death bed warn the narrator that though he is successful going about life as he is, his dignity is being systematically undermined by the status quo. When the narrator accepts the briefcase and the scholarship at the end, it signifies how he has traded his integrity for supposed acceptance among the white men. The grandfather’s appearance in the narrator’s dream shows him how incredibly foolish he has been by accepting and even rejoicing in his position. (628)

A Mysterious Revelation

In Flannery O’Connor’s short story “Revelation” she takes an ironic twist on Christian morality by focusing on judgment. Our protagonist, Mrs. Turpin, feels that she is incredibly blessed because God has given her “a little bit of everything” (75) and “made her a good woman” (75). Mrs. Turpin receives a revelation in the story. However, she is clearly not being told what she wants to hear. She is given the message that by judging others based on appearance and social class, she is undermining her own soul.
Mrs. Turpin expresses how she is thankful to God that He did not make her black, “white trash”, poor, ugly, or of a disagreeable disposition. While in the waiting room of the doctor’s office with her husband, the other characters who appear throughout this portion of the story (with the exception of Marcy Grace’s mother) represent what Mrs. Turpin wishes not to be as well as the groups that she is continually judging. She considers herself to be blessed in a way that is not truly grateful, but more arrogant and hypocritical. Her attitude is further revealed when she mentions how she sorts people into classes and considers herself and her husband, Claude, to be of almost the highest class possible.
Although Mrs. Turpin acts very judgmentally, the author wants us to assume that she is essentially a good person although she is extremely misguided. Through her love for her husband, it is apparent that she cares for more than just her own interests. She is being sent a revelation through the incident with Mary Grace because God seems to think that there is still hope for her and wants her to change. Mrs. Turpin’s attitude is also reflective of Flannery O’Connor’s views that during her lifetime that the South was a troubled place where the scourge of racism was the most socially profound.
Ironically, Mary Grace is more educated and sophisticated than Mrs. Turpin because she is studying hard and attending college. It seems as though God has taken the form of Mary Grace because Mrs. Turpin gets the sense that she has, “known her and disliked her all of her life--all of Mrs. Turpin’s life, it seemed too, not just all the girl’s life” (61) and that, “the girl did know her, knew her in some intense and personal way, beyond time and place and condition” (112). The timing of when Mary Grace looks up from her book to grimace at Mrs. Turpin is perfectly timed so that she does so just after Mrs. Turpin has either made a particularly harsh comment or had a very judgmental thought. Mary Grace’s name also has particular religious significance because “Mary” is the mother of God, and “Grace” is a state to which all pious individuals aspire. Flannery O’Connor also once said that, “Grace changes us and change is painful”, which is applicable to the story both literally and metaphorically due to Mary Grace’s attack on Mrs. Turpin and Mrs. Turpin’s later revelation.
When Mary Grace throws her book on human development at Mrs. Turpin, it is symbolic of Mrs. Turpin’s need to advance beyond her simple-minded opinions. The attack is an example of God working mysteriously and unexpectedly by appearing in unlikely and often inconvenient places. Initially, the attack in the waiting is clearly the last way that Mrs. Turpin would expect to have a life-altering revelation. However, she also recognizes that she has been “singled out for the message” (130) due to the celestial flicker in Mary Grace’s eyes.
Mrs. Turpin has an indignant conversation with God after the incident as she hoses down the hogs. The first vision she has of Mr. Turpin driving the field hands accompanied by a sense of sublime rapture shows the omnipresence of God and the ultimate insignificance of individual humans. Mrs. Turpin sees this first as way to humble her and guide her to the realization that she is not as important as she thinks herself to be. Her frustrated cry of, “Who do you think you are?” is both her question to God and her answer from God as the echo creates a chilling repetition.
The procession of souls that Mrs. Turpin sees shows black people, “white trash”, and disabled people along with people like the Turpins. However, the “outcasts” are traveling the past with joy and excitement, while the people blessed with “a little bit of everything” are more somber. When O’Connor says that “even their virtues were being burning away” she was likely referring to all pretentiousness and judgment by other humans instead of by God. Mrs. Turpin is being told that she needs to use the privileges she has been given to make a positive impact instead of using them as a way to place herself above those around her. (810)

The Woes of Youth

When I read the brief biography of Anne Tyler that accompanies her short story “Teenage Wasteland” in the textbook, it said that the story was published in the teen magazine “Seventeen”. At the time, which publications showcased the work seemed negligible, however, once I read the story I realized that it was clearly geared toward a high school-aged audience. The story seems to be intended as a sort of parable that illustrates the importance of not allowing one’s problems from high school (whether they be far away or close at hand) to characterize one’s life.
Telling the story from the perspective of the mother allows a young reader to see some typical teenage behaviors from the point of view of a parent. As Donny shirks his schoolwork, is disrespectful to his family, and disregards the rules, we cannot help but feel sympathy for Daisy. Though Daisy has nothing but good intentions for Donny, each one of her solutions eventually fails and causes her to gradually lose confidence in her parenting abilities. Furthermore, it is mentioned that Daisy also had a bad experience in high school. Tyler occasionally alludes to the fact that Daisy has yet to overcome the hardships that she faced in her youth. When she visits the principal’s office to discuss Donny’s problems in school, she seems to be more concerned with what the principal thinks of her than with her own son. Her self-conscious attitude almost makes her seem immature. In addition, when she returns to the principle’s office with her husband, she mentions how she feels as though she is about to be the one getting in trouble as she sits nervously on the couch outside on Mr. Lanham’s office. Her sentiments in this moment connect her and Donny, as if to suggest that she understands what Donny is going through and has not yet fully overcome it for herself.
Donny continually mentions his frustration at feeling trapped by the rules at school and the rules at home. Cal also brings him to the realization that his self-esteem suffers because all authority figures around him expect only the worst from him. Donny begins to see this anguish as the hand that life has dealt him and not merely a phase that will pass with time. His frustration leads him to his destructive behaviors such as being an irresponsible student despite his intelligence and deliberately breaking school rules. Making a habit of truancy only increases his problems because the authority figures in this life then become more frustrated with him. Donny is never taught any healthy coping mechanisms to get him through high school by either Daisy or Cal. Daisy is still grappling with the effects of her own high school experience and is too emotionally weary from failed attempts to help her son that she fails to realize that he is merely experiencing unoriginal, teenage angst. Cal seems to both have an agenda to keep Donny coming to him for financial benefit and be unfit to give Donny sound advice because he too is riddled with problems of his own.
Daisy is a foil to Cal because she (like Donny) seems to still be running away from the problems that plagued her in high school whereas Cal apparently wants to be a teenager forever. By ending his marriage and spending his days slumming with delinquent teens, he is likely desperately trying to regain the edenic youth that rock stars sing of and disillusioned adults such as himself seek either because he experienced no such thing in his own youth or because he fears losing himself in the quotidian mediocrity that seems to characterize the “real world”. He teaches Donny to blame all of his problems on the authority figures around him instead of doing what is expected of him. Had Donny learned to find a way to get through four years of high school safely, he could have moved on from his problems to bigger and better things instead of running away from his life altogether. (670).