MAKE UP 4

Invisible Man wasn’t the first novel, or thing, to not exactly like machines. Take for example the band Rage against the Machine. “I'm a brother with a furious mind
Action must be taken
We don't need the key
We'll break in
Something must be done
About vengeance, a badge and a gun
so rip the mic, rip the stage, rip the system
I was born to rage against 'em “ (sound familiar? Rage against the Machine was the title Ellison had on the rough draft of Invisible Man). Take also for example the machine imagery, and similar therapy, that opposes the main character of A Clockwork Orange. Alex, after years of being only amused by sheer violence coupled with random spurts of committing sodomy, is thrown in prison. After about 2 years in prison, he is able to fake his way to treatment to get better of his violent tendencies, and to get out of prison. The treatment he gets selected for, however, is not something you would want to willingly sign up for – its called the Ludovico technique. Its quite similar to the lobotomy in Invisible Man, but almost a thousand times worse and atleast a thousand times more graphic. What it is is a disturbed form of aversion therapy, where Alex is given a nausea inducing drug while watching videos with extremely disturbing acts of violence. This continues for an entire two weeks. Alex then realizes that the musical soundtracks shown with the violence are making him become nauseous; distressing him greatly because the only thing he loved more than sodomizing was Beethoven. The doctor’s think this is a hoot, plus the aversion therapy is working, so they continue out the two weeks and completely destroy Alex’s love for violence and classical music. The crazy thing is though is that a literal machine was strapped to Alex’s head, but also he lived in a dystopian society that allowed for this gruesome treatment to a gruesome man. You know who also hates mechanized things? That’s right – our BFF Grendel! Grendel, if you recall, hates the mechanized process of animals and the nearly mechanized void the humans have in society. Grendel’s only role in society is to destroy their cycle, and to take away hope from the humans. Grendel is extremely reluctant to refer to himself as an animal, despite his mother’s condition of running around in circles frantically and lacking language. Grendel even kills, savagely, a ram that does not heed his warning – illustrating his frustration with the mechanization of life. The narrator in Invisible Man certainly suffers at the hand of machines – the liberty paint factory machine that injures him and the lobotomy machine – but there are certaintly other cases of people hating machines of all kings the exact same. But, without that machine imagery, the narrator never would have received his disturbed baptism and never would have reached the climax of character in the brotherhood. Or, Alex would have been a stagnant, flat character that remained unchallenged by the mundane life in prison. Grendel would not have been alive without his animal mother, although he may have been happy with that.