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)