they believed the authors probably would have preferred to publish. They only succeeded in creating confusion. On the other hand, it is not fair for an editor simply to abandon a writer’s last draft, as the editors of Ernest Hemingway’s The Islands in the Stream (1970) did, producing a book the author himself would no doubt have tweaked and tightened for the good of all. The editor who documents all changes causes the reader to howl in pain at the seventeen times per page the reading process is interrupted with footnotes regarding the author’s misspelling of “separate”—“barb-wire,” Edmund Wilson (1895-1972), an American author and critic, called such footnotes—while the editor who does anything less will have to face the wrath of indignant scholars descending like a flock of nibbling ducks. The editors of Hemingway’s other posthumous novel, The Garden of Eden (1986), handled the task about as well as anyone could expect, presenting the world with a unified work of art that certainly seems to represent the voice of the author, and then being quite open and thorough in public discussions about explaining what they did and why. Though the debate will likely be endless about whether Juneteenth is a fair representation of the work on which Ralph Ellison labored for parts of five decades, John F. Callahan, a noted scholar of African American literature, has edited into life a fascinating and complex work of literature.

Callahan has been down this road before with the work of Ellison, but it was not previously so perilous a path. As Ellison’s literary executor, he oversaw the publication of both Flying Home and Other Stories (1996) and The Collected Essays of Ralph Ellison (1995). Superficially, each of these collections only had to bring together material that was previously dispersed or unpublished. In Flying Home and Other Stories, though, Callahan went a step further, carefully organizing the selections in such a way as to call attention to Ellison’s thematic unity and his development as a writer, highlighting the value of work that might otherwise have become mere scholarly ephemera. Nonetheless, even this deft editorial touch found its detractors. In Juneteenth, however, Callahan is dealing with material whose very absence from the public’s eye had made it legendary in literary circles for forty years, material so complex that a single false step could destroy its integrity. The work Callahan helped the deceased writer to present is quite likely the best one any editor could have found in Ellison’s manuscripts, even if it remains frustratingly elusive.

At least it becomes clear why it took Ellison so many years to write a second novel. His first novel, The Invisible Man (1952), is one of the most read, most assigned, and most honored American novels of the twentieth century. If that is a wonderful thing for a writer to have said about a first novel, it is also a terrible thing, for how does one top it? Most of Ellison’s readership would probably have been thrilled if he could have written another just like it, only different. The writer himself was striving not for repetition, but for brilliance. According to Callahan’s introduction, much of the work was done by 1959, and by 1961 Ellison felt it was nearing readiness for publication. It was still unpublished in 1969, however, when a fire destroyed Ellison’s home and the edited manuscript on which he had been working. Using his most recent copy, he began to try to restore the changes that he had lost—and then began to tinker with it, a process he would never complete. The mountain of material he produced eventually broke itself into three separate parts, only one of which, the middle section, could stand alone as a book.Juneteenth is that middle section, with minor additions from other sections and from published sections added for the sake of coherence.

Ellison’s goal was nothing less than to produce an innovative work of literary genius. Anyone reading The Invisible Man side by side with Richard Wright’s Native Son (1940) and Black Boy (1945) is likely to see the influence that Wright had over the first-time novelist. It is not that Ellison was trying to imitate Richard Wright, but Wright had set the stage on which The Invisible Man moved. The nameless character of that book was not a Richard Wright, not a Bigger Thomas, a character facing hyperreal and sometimes surreal versions of the dilemmas that Wright’s characters encounter in a naturalistic framework. By contrast,Juneteenth is clearly the work of a writer whose vision has matured. Though much of the writing was done in the 1950’s, it is closer in spirit to the work of Toni Morrison than of Richard Wright in its uncompromising devotion to language and insight over plot.

Juneteenth is the story of a 1950’s race-baiting senator from New England, Senator Adam Sunraider, who is shot on the Senate floor by a young black man. After he is shot, the senator shouts out a question to God: “Why?” Remarkably, a black preacher from the visitors’ gallery answers back. This preacher, Reverend Alonzo Hickman, had traveled to Washington, D.C., to warn the senator about rumors that a black man was planning an assassination attempt, and he is the one visitor the senator will allow. For the rest of the novel, the senator is near death or rallying, and the novel is an adventure into his interior mind and into the two men’s shared past.

The senator, readers quickly learn, was brought up as the reverend’s ward for reasons that are unclear until the end. Although he calls him “Daddy Hickman,” Bliss (as Sunraider was named as a boy) is not Hickman’s biological son. Bliss’s true heritage is obscure; he may or may not have any black ancestry but, culturally, he is brought up as a Negro. Hickman is a barnstorming, revival preacher whose show-stopping performance is to have Bliss emerge reborn out of a coffin—an act that frightens the boy, especially when it is interrupted by an apparently crazy white woman who calls him her son. The young boy naturally wonders: Who is my mother?

The story that develops in the present is one of Hickman’s attempt to save his foster son’s soul on what may well be his deathbed. Hickman draws Sunraider back into his old world by luring the senator into sermons they both remember from the old days. Hickman emerges as the far more engaging character, in part because he seems to see religion as a scam, but a genuine scam; he tries to trick people into a salvation in which he believes. By contrast, though Bliss’s development is engaging, readers are never close enough to the person Sunraider became to understand how he went from Bliss to a con man filmmaker to Sunraider. Readers see enough of him as a young man to understand why he might have chosen to leave Hickman and his own assumed negritude behind, but not a word as to how he did. Much of this material is probably somewhere in the author’s papers, awaiting publication of the longer, scholarly edition.

There is a story here, though, and Callahan has done good editorial work in finding it. It develops approximately backward, from Bliss’s career as a scam movie director (pointing a camera with no film at a woman he later seduces), to his earlier childhood career as a boy preacher, to his birth. One of the dangers of knowing that a work like Juneteenth was assembled posthumously is that the reader may be disinclined to trust that the disparate elements that seem to come chaotically (Bliss’s uncertain racial background, the importance of the woman he seduces, the identity and motive of the shooter) will ever come together to form a clear picture. The reader who goes looking for chaos in this novel will find nothing more. The reader who trusts in Ellison’s (edited) authorial control over this material will find the puzzle Ellison offers challenging but will be rewarded in the end.

The title, Juneteenth, refers to June 19, 1865, two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation. It is the day that Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, and told the slaves there that they were free, a day celebrated in both Bliss’s youth and Ellison’s as the start of liberation. “There’s been a heap of Juneteenths before this one and I tell you there’ll be a heap more before we’re truly free,” Daddy Hickman tells Bliss, “but keep to the rhythm, just keep to the rhythm and keep to the way.” Liberation, he implies, is an ongoing process, never a done deed, and the Juneteenth celebration of a freedom declared two years before its enforcement is the perfect image of his meaning. Freedom did not come at once; it came long after its announcement, and its arrival was only the start of the liberation process. This advice to “Keep to the rhythm” is advice a reader will have to follow to appreciate the novel. Hickman’s many sermons try to embody the rhythms of “the way” to freedom, to salvation. By contrast, Sunraider’s stiff, stentorian tones have mostly abandoned this rhythm in his one senatorial speech in the novel. Trading oratorical “riffs” with Sunraider is Hickman’s way of trying to bring him back to the rhythm of the way, like one jazz soloist trying to coax and cajole another. The reader, however, will also have to pay attention to the rhythm of the narrative in another sense. After a brief period of collaborative remembering of the past between Hickman and Sunraider, the novel ends with separate interior reflections that the two men do not or cannot share with each other. The completion that the reader sees is one the characters never share. They remain in a fragmented world.

This point goes directly to the big questions of racial and American identity that the novel is trying to face. To what degree is race a “real” thing? If Sunraider’s biological background is not black, does that make him any less “Negro”? Does the color line, which is so often crossed on the level of culture and the level of personal life, divide America or define it? The answer that Juneteenth tilts toward is reminiscent of the one W. E. B. Du Bois presented to the world at the beginning of the twentieth century. In The Souls of Black Folk (1903), he declared that what best defines America, the spirit of struggle for freedom, is most fully embodied by the African American tradition. Ellison’s novel concurs with this carefully formulated position, which allows for generalizations but no universalizing. It is a hopeful position, since hybridization is key to all culture (anyone can listen to Duke Ellington and watch William Shakespeare’s plays), but Ellison is not about to be deluded by false hope. The race line was very much a fact of life in 1955, and as Bliss/Sunraider lies near death, the gulf between him and the darker Hickman appears irredeemable. (The reader will have to await the publication of the full, scholarly version to learn if this is correct.)

Ralph Ellison was not trying to create a second Invisible Man; he was trying to surpass it. This turned out to be an impossible task. A completed version of Juneteenth may have come close, but Ellison was never able to find that version. What readers have instead is an ambitious, sprawling novel that challenges them to rethink America, religion, art, and themselves, and along the way seals its author’s reputation as among the most aesthetically ambitious writers of ideas.

Sources for Further Study

The Atlantic Monthly 284 (July, 1999): 89.

Booklist 95 (March 1, 1999): 1103.

Essence 30 (August, 1999): 66.

Fortune 140 (July 5, 1999): 52.

Library Journal 124 (May 1, 1999): 109.

The Nation 268 (June 14, 1999): 36.

National Review 51 (June 14, 1999): 49.

The New Republic 220 (June 28, 1999): 38.

The New York Review of Books 46 (August 12, 1999): 16.

The New York Times Book Review 104 (June 20, 1999): 4.

The New York Times Magazine, May 23, 1999, p. 50.

Publishers Weekly 246 (March 22, 1999): 68.

Time 153 (June 28, 1999): 66.

Yale Review 87 (October, 1999): 145.

Juxtaposition

Ellison employs contrasting images, such as light and darkness, and emotions, like bliss and fear, to highlight the influence of race on characters in the South before the Civil Rights movement. In one scene, parishioners are deeply moved by the power and energy of salvation and the Word. Suddenly, they are gripped by fear as they anticipate the repercussions of having to subdue a deranged white woman at their revival. By juxtaposing these emotions and images, Ellison exposes the core of race relations in the South. He showcases the intelligence, integrity, and dedication of black Americans in contrast to the oppression and racism they faced during this historical period.

Figurative Language

Ellison utilizes figurative language in Juneteenth to disrupt the linear flow of his narrative. The novel follows the straightforward story of Bliss, Hickman, and Sunraider. However, their history is interspersed with dreams and memories brought to life through hyperboles, similes, and ironic visual constructs. For instance, while Sunraider is delivering a speech before the Senate, he hallucinates that the eagle from the Great Seal is attacking him, flapping its wings in front of his face and clutching the olive branch and arrows. The bird stares intensely into the senator’s eyes, all while Sunraider continues his speech before his fellow senators and those in the Visitors’ Gallery. This is just one example of how a literal event is interrupted by figurative language.

Early in his career, Ellison understood the significance of detailed physical descriptions, particularly those that engage multiple senses. As a result, Reverend Hickman and his followers become vividly real in Ellison's depiction of their encounter with the Capitol guards. Their symbolic presence is evident when they gather to pray at the Lincoln Memorial. Bliss's conversations with his peers highlight the growing tension between his role as a boy-preacher and his desire to be an ordinary young boy. The onset of puberty is strikingly depicted when the preadolescent Bliss tentatively approaches the sleeping Sister Georgia and gently lifts her nightgown. Similar feelings of wonder and yearning are clear as Bliss recalls his early experiences at the movies. Later, Ellison illustrates Bliss's evolving personality by describing his admiration for the beauty of the Oklahoma landscape and Miss Teasing Brown.

Indeed, Juneteenth is abundant in sensory detail. For example, Sunraider’s awareness is filled with the minutiae of his assassination, from the shattering chandelier overhead to his frantic movements as he tries to escape the bullets. He vividly remembers his fear and impatience while confined in the white coffin, as well as the redheaded woman and the deaconesses struggling over him. Similarly, Hickman recalls every thought and action from the night Bliss was born; as they recount their sermons, both men essentially relive these moments.

Many of Ellison's physical details carry symbolic meaning. For instance, Bliss's white coffin not only represents the role Hickman envisions for him as a resurrected child-savior but also his "rebirth" into a new, Caucasian identity. The movies serve as another symbol; just as they present only an illusion of life, Sunraider also speaks and lives a deceptive, self-deluding image. In the same way, the teenager’s photograph of Hickman’s group praying before the Lincoln statue, "a good scale of grays between the whiteness of the marble and the blackness of the shadows," reveals much about these characters and their significance in contemporary American society.

As in his previous works, Ellison incorporates elements of African-American culture, including sermons, tall tales, folk history, and music. Callahan notes the influence of "the antiphonal call-and-response patterns of the black church" on Ellison’s narrative structure, as the words and thoughts of Bliss and Hickman alternate and merge. Ellison’s notes describe Hickman’s sermons as a blend of "folk poetry and religious rhetoric" and a mix of "the sacred in the profane," with Hickman using "vernacular terms and phrases" to discuss religious themes. Hickman himself mentions moments when his passion led him to burst into words and music from his worldly past, although he always quickly corrected himself by switching to a religious song or phrase.

Ellison's early aspiration to be a professional musician likely influenced the significant role that music plays in much of his fiction. He initially envisioned Juneteenth as an American symphony in literary form, incorporating numerous movements that mirror the diversity of American culture. Callahan's account of editing this novel reads much like the analysis of a complex musical piece, where the composer has woven together multiple themes and variations. The editor recounts how he "followed the twists and turns of Ellison's plot, and his characters' movements through space and time; traced and retraced their steps as they moved from Washington, D.C., south to Georgia and Alabama, southwest to Oklahoma, back again to the nation's capital, and reached back with them from the novel's present moment of the mid-fifties to spots of time in the twenties and thirties and even farther to the first decade of the new century when the Oklahoma Territory emerged as a state."

Ellison, named after Ralph Waldo Emerson, seems to have succeeded in blending Emerson's refined diction and syntax, Walt Whitman's vision of an American epic, and George Gershwin's concept of an American jazz symphony. This combination aims to bridge the cultural and racial divides among Americans. As Callahan has noted, the rhythm of Ellison's prose exhibits "the riffs and bass lines of jazz." Ellison's notes draw a comparison between "a great religious leader" and a skilled jazz musician: "He evokes emotions that move beyond the rational onto the mystical. A jazz musician does something of the same. By his manipulation of sound and rhythm he releases movements and emotions which allow for the transcendence of everyday reality."

Moreover, Ellison always remembered the advice from his music mentors, emphasizing that mere technical proficiency cannot replace the "intelligent and artistic structuring of emotion."

In Juneteenth, much like in most of Ralph Ellison's works, the primary social issues revolve around race: racial attitudes, racial tension, and racial identity. Ellison dedicates the novel "To That Vanished Tribe into Which I Was Born: The American Negroes," symbolized in this story by Reverend A. Z. Hickman and the forty-three other elderly black men and women who join him in his mission to "save" the man who has become their most vocal political adversary. Hickman is introduced to Senator Adam Sunraider's secretary as "God's Trombone" and to the reader as "a huge, distinguished-looking old fellow who on the day of the chaotic event was to prove himself, his age notwithstanding, an extraordinarily powerful man."

However, the respect that Hickman's followers and the novel's readers have for him is not shared by the white residents of Washington whom the group encounters. The Senator's secretary dismisses their visit as trivial; the Capitol guards handle them roughly and with contempt, searching them without cause; the hotel staff refuse them entry to the Senator's secret suite; and even the editors of the opposition newspaper are unwilling to hear their message. In essence, while Adam Sunraider's extreme rhetoric has embarrassed his party and constituents, the white Establishment still shares his fundamental disdain for people he considers weak and insignificant.

Ellison makes it clear that this disregard is a fatal flaw—not just in Sunraider, but in American society as a whole. After Sunraider is shot and Severen appears to fall fatally from the visitors' gallery to the Senate floor, Hickman cries out to the surrogate son who has rejected him, "Bliss! You were our last hope, Bliss; now Lord have mercy on this dying land!" If Sunraider, whom Hickman had envisioned as an American racial messiah, could twist his upbringing from preaching Christian love to espousing racial bigotry, Hickman loses hope for any possibility of racial harmony in America.

During his interactions with the dying Senator and his introspection, Hickman ultimately realizes that he too made a significant error: he prayed for Bliss as a minister, leader, even "redeemer" who would unite African-Americans and Caucasian Americans, but he neglected to pray for "the boy"—for Bliss himself, as an individual. In other words, he also overlooked the person behind the role. To some extent, Hickman might be reflecting a common parental tendency to assume some responsibility for a child's missteps; however, once again, Ellison seems to highlight the widespread modern inclination towards stereotyping and depersonalization, varying in form and degree but not in essence.

Ellison does not ignore the issue of racial injustice in America. However, he often employs patience and humor to soften the impact of anger and bitterness. For example, during the Juneteenth celebration/revival, when Miss Lorelli (described by Bliss as the tall, redheaded woman) tries to grab Bliss, the deaconesses quickly move to shield him. Hickman attributes the fierceness of these women to their years of raising white children, only to lose their respect and affection once these children grow up. This experience has made African-American women fiercely protective of their children, and the idea of losing a child they consider their own is unbearable. Though Hickman discusses their frustration in a humorous context, suggesting that men find it difficult to understand women, he clearly believes their attitudes are justified. On the lighter side, Mrs. Proctor gets a bit of humorous revenge when her employer, Mrs. Simmons, demands to know "the secret formula" for particularly clean clothes. Similarly, Mrs. Proctor and Body's mother can even sympathize with "crazy Miss Lorelli," feeling for both the adult woman wasting her time on clay pigeons and the young girl unprepared for her first menstrual period.

Despite this, instances of severe racial violence are a recurring theme. Ellison does not specifically reference the men falsely accused and convicted of rape in Scottsboro as he does in his short stories. Still, that incident, the 1913 race riots in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and possibly the more recent murder of Emmet Till in Mississippi, seem to be part of the racial backdrop. When Bliss's mother seeks help from Hickman, he suspects her motives because her accusations led to his brother's lynching and castration, followed by his mother's death from grief. Similarly, when he and Sister Bearmasher return Miss Lorelli to her home, Hickman is brutally beaten and feels fortunate not to have been killed. In Juneteenth, however, Ellison focuses on the process by which Hickman and Sunraider come to understand their relationship's dynamics, with racial violence serving as the backdrop for the main story.

The relationship between Hickman and Sunraider/Bliss hinges on the mystery of the boy's racial identity. Hickman knows Bliss's mother is white, but he does not know who the boy's biological father is. As Mrs. Proctor notes, Bliss "don't show no sign in his skin or hair or features, only in his talking." By not revealing Bliss's full background, Ellison portrays him as the quintessential American. Ellison's notes highlight that "the question of his having Negro blood isn't important; it is the fact that he himself can't be sure whether he has or not."

While keeping vigil beside the Senator's bed, Hickman recounts the story of the Senator's birth. He explains that the Senator's mother arrived at his cottage, where he personally delivered the baby. Despite his reservations, Hickman cared for both mother and child. Eventually, the mother departed, leaving her son with Hickman to "replace" the brother she had cost him through her deceit. Over time, Hickman let go of his hatred and began preparing the boy, whom he named Bliss, to become a minister who would unite all ethnicities. As Bliss reached adolescence, he started to run away. Realizing the limitations faced by African-Americans, he reinvented himself as a white man, substituting religion with pop culture and politics. Ellison notes that even years later, Bliss continues to metaphorically flee from his past, posing a constant threat to his new identity because "his own power depends upon his manipulation of race." Moreover, he cannot evade Hickman; Sister Neal observes that even his racist speeches in the Senate mirror the language and techniques of his mentor, which Sunraider eventually acknowledges. Despite rejecting Hickman and embracing racial prejudice, he still harbors love for the man he once called "Daddy," and this perceived "weakness" in himself is what he resents most. He is aware of the inherent corruption in political power, which Ellison describes as "not biological or genetic, but man-made and political, economic ... and immoral as far as the American ideal has a religious component."

Although the primary social issues addressed are racial, Ellison also explores the concept of family, including the extended family. Hickman clearly becomes a surrogate father to Bliss, and initially, Bliss depends on the wisdom and strength of "Daddy Hickman" much like most young children trust their fathers. For Hickman, adopting Bliss is a transformative experience; this former jazz musician and gambler finds himself drawn to the vocation of his preacher-father. Even as a young boy, Bliss plays an active role in religious services. He lies in a closed white coffin, which is carried into the revival tent. Upon Hickman's signal, Deacon Wilhite opens the coffin to release him. Bliss then emerges to engage in a dialogue with Hickman, posing questions as Reverend Bliss and receiving responses and explanations from Reverend Hickman. In this way, they are both ministerial colleagues and father and son.

Eventually, Bliss finds his role to be both physically and mentally restrictive. He dreads being confined in the coffin for too long and realizes that his position as a boy-preacher isolates him from the pleasures his peers enjoy. At this juncture, he rejects the path Hickman has set for him, the racial identity he has always known, and—in Hickman's words—God. Although he initially becomes a traveling con-man posing as an independent filmmaker and later a race-baiting politician, he cannot fully sever his ties with Hickman and the broader African-American community. Throughout his career, a widespread network of railroad waiters, Pullman porters, chauffeurs, hotel maids, ministers, church members, and other traveling friends have monitored Sunraider's activities and kept Hickman informed. Hickman has shielded the Senator's true background, allowing him time and opportunity to repent for his betrayal. Now, Janey Mason, part of this extended family, has alerted Hickman to an impending crisis he tries in vain to prevent.

Another significant social concern is religion, particularly conservative Christianity. The Biblical influence's thematic and structural significance becomes evident early in the novel. When Sunraider realizes he has been shot, his cries mirror both Christ's agony in Gethsemane and his own childhood fear while waiting to be released from his ceremonial coffin: "Lord, LAWD, WHY HAST THOU ... Forsaken ... forsaken ... forsaken. ..." Hickman's response from the gallery seems almost like divine judgment: "For Thou has forsaken ... me." This exchange introduces the theme of Bliss as a prodigal son and potential redeemer who has gone astray, a parallel reinforced by both men's memories of the role Bliss feared and grew to despise: his symbolic rebirth during Hickman's revival sermon. The signal for him to emerge from the white coffin was Jesus' command, "Suffer the little children to come unto me." Furthermore, as "Daddy Hickman" repeatedly sacrificed his son in his revival sermons, he followed the Biblical pattern of God's sacrifice of Christ and Abraham's near-sacrifice of Isaac.

Religion plays a significant role in the lives of both men, underscored by the importance of sermons in their conversations and memories. Sister Neal notes that, during the speech Sunraider delivers when he is shot, he almost mocks Hickman's sermons by cynically invoking God before immediately resorting to racial slurs. The novel reaches its climax when Hickman and Sunraider recreate their sermons on American history, the evils of slavery, and the crucifixion, which they originally preached during the pivotal Juneteenth celebration and revival. Additionally, Sunraider remembers returning to preach at Greater Calvary after running away, only to find that no one recognized him. In recalling his interactions with Sister Georgia, he repeats a mini-sermon he used to impress her, and flashbacks to his conversations with his friend Body reveal that he often "preached" to his peers.

When Hickman inquires about an event in McAlester from twenty-five years ago, Sunraider once again "preaches" the sermons he used that day, which he and Hickman credit to the Right Reverend John P. Eatmore. However, Sunraider seems unable to recognize the ironic parallel between these sermons—focusing on man's yearning for heavenly fire and God's mercy in allowing man to rise above his base nature—and his own vanity and Hickman's patience with him.

Ellison was ahead of his time in discussing American popular culture, particularly movies. Even before Bliss sees his first film, he is captivated by the idea, as he later remarks, that "most of the action which gives a movie movement lies between the frames, in the dark." These "hidden" sections mirror the concealed aspects of Bliss/Sunraider's life, as he transforms the showmanship Hickman used for spiritual purposes into tools for secular gain, first as a traveling "movie-man" and later as a politician.

For Bliss, movies become his connection to white culture. When he enters the theater with Hickman, he does so as an African-American, but upon seeing Mary Pickford on screen, he becomes obsessed with the notion that she is his true biological mother. The movies and their illusions soon replace Hickman and the church as his surrogate family. Pursuing his obsession with Mary Pickford, Bliss returns to the theater alone, only to find that he receives more respect when mistaken for being Caucasian.

Later, as Bliss travels across the country with his companions, Karp and Donelson, he becomes acutely aware of the power movies have to influence the unsuspecting residents of small-town America. In many of these towns, the fake filmmakers are treated like celebrities. However, they ironically miss capturing any commercially valuable footage because they lack the funds to buy film. Only in one town do a group of local men see through their ruse, forcing them to protect themselves from violence by mimicking the three wise monkeys who see, hear, and speak no evil.

Politics is also woven into the fabric of American popular culture, and Adam Sunraider has transitioned from movie showmanship to political showmanship, though this shift remains one of the novel's "hidden" aspects. He has successfully erased all traces of his Southern/Southwestern heritage, yet he understands how to exploit the racial awareness he learned as a boy to manipulate the American political landscape. Apart from a few conservative Southern politicians, he has no allies in the Senate. In fact, he is aware that he is an embarrassment to his party and constituents, but he dismisses his adversaries as irrelevant because he wields significant political power. His thoughts during his Senate speech reveal that he is fully aware of the destructive nature of his influence. However, his arrogance, cynicism, and self-absorption are so profound that he seems to take pleasure in his ability to control, insult, and discomfort others. Ironically, this same attitude was evident in his treatment of women like Miss Teasing Brown, which may have provided both a personal and philosophical motive for Severen's attack.

1930s–1940s: Benjamin Davis Sr. makes history as the first African American general in the United States Army.

Today: African Americans occupy significant roles in Congress and all branches of the military. Colin Powell, an African American, served as Secretary of State during the first term of President George W. Bush.

1930s–1940s: Jackie Robinson breaks the color barrier by becoming the first black player in Major League Baseball.

Today: Athletes from diverse ethnic backgrounds compete in Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, the National Football League, and the National Hockey League.

1930s–1940s: President Franklin Roosevelt enacts the Social Security Act and the Wealth Tax Act, which help to reduce the concentration of wealth and power.

Today: The United States faces economic challenges. In the last quarter of 2003, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported nearly 8.8 million unemployed individuals. By October 2004, approximately 8.2 million people were still without jobs.

1930s–1940s: Apartheid is instituted in South Africa, enshrining racial discrimination in laws that segregate black Africans into designated living and working areas. Many black Africans are forcibly relocated multiple times by the oppressive regime.

Today: South Africans dismantled apartheid in 1994 through all-race elections. Although the country continues to face challenges, it is progressing towards becoming a safer and more democratic state.

Given that Christianity plays a central role in this novel, Ellison drew inspiration from Biblical narratives. For instance, the dynamic between Hickman and Bliss mirrors that of Abraham and Isaac. Just as Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son to fulfill God's will, Hickman symbolically sacrifices his foster son each time he places him in the white coffin. Additionally, there is a resemblance between Bliss and Samuel, the Old Testament judge. Hickman perceives Bliss as a divine gift and a child dedicated to serving God.

Bliss/Sunraider's career starkly contrasts the New Testament story of St. Paul. Unlike the former persecutor who transformed into an apostle and a significant figure in early Christian evangelism, Bliss is a preacher who turns apostate. He exemplifies the destructive nature of selfishness, vanity, and the lust for personal power. Other notable New Testament themes include dying to sin and being reborn in righteousness, symbolized by Bliss's white coffin, and the echoes of the Sermon on the Mount in Hickman's invocation of Christ's command to "Suffer the little children to come unto me." Hickman's entire vision for Bliss's life seems rooted in the belief that this young boy could become a Christ-like figure, guiding adult society away from racial prejudice and towards childlike acceptance. Ironically, however, Sunraider's death will neither be sacrificial nor redemptive.

History not only serves as a major theme but also as a critical source in the novel. References to Lincoln, Emancipation, and the celebration of Juneteenth highlight Ellison's interest in how historical figures and events impact the lives of ordinary people. Although the Scottsboro trial is never directly mentioned, Ellison's allusions to it in his other works indicate that he was profoundly affected by this injustice. While he avoids detailing it, he was undoubtedly influenced by other instances of racial violence, such as the 1913 race riots in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the death of Emmet Till in the 1950s, and the lynchings that mar American history in this century. Moreover, he was clearly aware of how such violence had been portrayed by other writers like Richard Wright.

While attending Tuskegee, Ellison became familiar with the works of influential 1930s writers such as T.S. Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, W.B. Yeats, Joseph Conrad, and Gertrude Stein. For Ellison, The Waste Land served as a significant motivation to write, and his admiration for Eliot's later works is evident in his use of a quotation from "Little Gidding." He also spoke of reading Hemingway's Spanish Civil War reports, which he appreciated for their vivid depictions of scenes and actions, elements that similarly define Ellison's writing style. Joyce's influence is most apparent in the narrative structure of Juneteenth, with the memories and dialogues of Hickman and Bliss merging into a stream of consciousness reminiscent of Ulysses.

Ellison's depiction of American society also mirrors his engagement with other American novelists. His notes indicate Mark Twain's influence; he draws parallels between Hickman and Sunraider with Jim and Huck, and Sunraider's portrayal may also be influenced by Twain's depiction of Tom Driscoll/Chambers in Pudd'nhead Wilson. The issue of racial identity is central to that novel, and Ellison seemed to consider the Mississippi River as integral to the American psyche, much like Twain did. Moreover, both authors might have aimed to correct the perceived misrepresentation of African-American men as "devout Christians" in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

The river also connects Ellison to William Faulkner, another writer who delved into racial identity through characters like Charles Bon (Absalom, Absalom!) and Joe Christmas (Light in August). Bon's racial identity is crucial to Absalom, but Faulkner once remarked that Bon probably always knew his racial background and only considered it significant when he realized its importance to the Sutpens. Joe Christmas more closely resembles Bliss; both are children of a Caucasian mother and a father of unknown racial identity. Like Bliss, Christmas is treated as African-American and manipulates others—especially women—in his efforts to escape that identity, ultimately leading to personal ruin for both men.

However, the most significant philosophical influence on Ellison was Richard Wright. Wright was not only Ellison's longtime friend and literary mentor but also provided Ellison with his initial writing assignments. Although Juneteenth is not explicitly a novel of social protest, Ellison addresses many of the same issues of racial prejudice found in Wright's fiction, his own earlier works, and those of other African-American writers. These themes are so pervasive that pinpointing a specific influence is likely impossible.

Callahan has noted that Ellison started contemplating this novel as he was concluding Invisible Man. Juneteenth appears to aim at broadening certain themes and reflecting on issues discussed in the previous novel and his short stories. It is possible that part of Ellison's struggle to finish his second novel stemmed from the ambitious goal he set for himself: to delve into the origins of America's racial conflicts and, through comprehension, propose hope that the nation might eventually fulfill its democratic principles.

Excerpts from an interview between Elizabeth Farnsworth and Ralph Ellison in the 1960s, followed by a 2000 interview with John Callahan, the editor of Juneteenth and Ralph Ellison’s literary executor, can be found at PBS Newshour (accessed November 24, 2004). This content is hosted by The Public Broadcasting Service website.

A 1977 interview with Ralph Ellison, conducted by novelist and poet Ishmael Reed at Ellison’s home, is available at The New York Times.