You sure that about 'equality' was a mistake?"

Oh, yes, sir," I said. "I was swallowing blood."

The hero's complicity in the rendering of his own invisibility comes full force at the end. The imagery of the hero swallowing blood mirrors how the narrator, a black man, chose to swallow his own anger and shame. The hero was fully aware that he was nothing more than another black man to these drunken white people, an object of entertainment. However, instead of pummeling the nearest drunk, the narrator decides to swallow his rage, because the townspeople offer him a scholarship to the "state college for Negroes."

Another image that has greater social relevance is the gathering at the ballroom. This gathering serves as a microcosm of a town whose class structure is delineated by race. The white people in the room, the town's important citizens were all white (and male). The...
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