Search for True Identity in the Invisible Man"Who am I?" (Ellison 386) This question intrigued the invisible man, the anonymous, unidentified narrator of Ralph Ellison's acclaimed novel, Invisible Man Throughout the story, the narrator embarks on a mental and physical journey to search for what he believes to be "true identity", a belief everything. completely erroneous, because although he is unaware of it, he was already inhabiting real identities from the beginning is filled with constant eruptions of mental trauma The greatest psychological burden he carries is his identity, or rather his identity. misguided He feels “pissed off” (Ellison 3) that people see him as they like to believe he is and do not see him as he really is Throughout his life, he assumes several identities. different and none, he thinks, adequately represents his true self, down to his last, as an invisible man. The narrator thinks that the many identities he possesses are not reflected, but he fails to recognize that identity is simply a mirror that reflects the environment and the person looking at it. It is only in this reflection of the immediate environment that the viewer can understand the identity of the narrator. Viewers only see the part of the narrator that is seemingly connected to their own world. The obscured part is unknown and therefore insignificant. Lucius Brockway, a former operator of the paint factory, saw the narrator only as an existence threatening his job, although the narrator was sent there simply to assist him. Brockway repeatedly questions the narrator about his purpose there and his mechanical credentials, but never even bothers to ask his name. Because the old man, who is the narrator as a person, is not interested. What it is as an object and what that object's relationship is to Lucius Brockway's engine room is important. The narrator's identity arises from this relationship, and this relationship suggests to Brockway that his identity is a "threat." However, the viewer decides to see someone, this is the identity they attribute to that person. The Closing of The American Mind, by Allan Bloom, explains this identity phenomenon by comparing two “ships of states” (Bloom 113). If one ship "is to be forever at sea, [and] another is to reach port and the passengers become separated, they think of each other and of their relationships on the ship in the two cases very differently" ( Bloom 113).