King of the Bingo Game: An analysis

exp wholenessnt of the bingo patch by Ralph Ellison is ab away a man, in frightening ask of silver, bearded darnel at a bingo gimpy. much importantly, the bilgewater revolves around a desperate man seeking sanity and dissolver in a humanity he cannot control. This desperate and futile search for answers is what at last leads him to his demise.The backdrop of the story is during World state of war II. This time was particularly chaotic as the war is pulling on the sparing resources of everyone. It is to a greater extent chaotic for the bingo mightiness as his married charr is sick and he needs money for her c be. He cannot flex in the factories, as he has no birth certificate. The last find oneself he has is a beano game creation held in a movie playing area. This is the jell where his life depart end. This is the menage where the contradictions of liberty and thrall, wealth and p everywherety, Sanity and madness will all meet.A spacious factor of this story in the race of the main character. He is a black man spiritedness from the south. This is the 1940s therefrom slavery has been abolished for m whatever time. Yet, The beano King is still a slave to something else. He has an inability to occupy money, yet is in desperate need of it. He cannot work in the factories hence he is exercisingless to society. there is a promise of money from a game hence he blots all his apprehends into it. The slavery in this story is slavery to capitalism. there is this illusion that one can thread it rich on ones stimulate merits. Yet, as Bingo King himself says in filename extension to the Wheel, This is matinee idol.This is the contradiction to the standard desire of equal rights and freedom that America is unremarkably personified. The idea that all men are created equal and are free to act on life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This is all dashed asunder by the rove around, which flippantly controls the ebb and play of l ife and dowery.The Bingo King, upon concreteizing this, realizes that his yet hope for sanity and fortune is through this wheel, which he now believes controls all things. An idea desire freedom or equality seems lopsided in the face of this machine, which deals out fortune or loss on a predilection. Upon eyesight this, the Bingo King realizes that only through the constant spinning of the wheel will his life have any meaning. This is the failure of sanity, which leads him to his death.In a way, the journey that the Bingo king under frivol aways is parallel to that of the Faustus in Christopher Marlowes classic play. Faustus is a impressive and rarefied man of science. One notable attribute about Faust is that he has a mystifying thirst for knowledge and understanding. This is a noble and proud endeavor, not one that would be considered wrong or sick by any standards. The problem comes with the methods that he uses to assume that knowledge. In his thirst, he signs his s oul everywhere to the demon Mephistopheles so that he whitethorn be granted violences not meant for lethal man. Over the course of the story, Faustus takes a journey that leads him into arrogance and madness. The story comes to an end with a vision of Faustus creation dragged kicking and let out into hellfire.There is a definite Faustian cornerstone that prevails throughout King of the Bingo back up. identical Faust, the Bingo King starts on this journey for a noble endeavor. He wishes for the means to take care of his wife Laura. His motives are pure and honorable, and he seeks no more than the money needed to take care of his sick wife. As he r separatelyes the bingo wheel, he sees the power that it holds over his own life. He sees that life is obviously a matter of fate, controlled by chance and whim of luck. The Bingo King sees this whim of luck as God. So by his reasoning, if he controls the wheel, he becomes God. It is then that he becomes mad with a sense of nonsen sical power.We see this from his thoughts he has misgivinging the crowd in the theater. As they heckle and jeer him from his con motilityation to leave the stage, the Bingo King becomes more and more inwardly hostile towards themThey had been acting the bingo game day in and night out for years, trying to pull round rent money or ground beef change. But not one of those advised guys had discovered this wonderful thing.Now he faced the raging crowd with rebelliousness He was running the show, by God They had to react to him, for he was their luck. This is me, he thought. let the bastards yell.Ralph Ellison, King of the Bingo GameHe looks at the crowd and he sees them as fools. He does this be former he thinks that he has found the answer. This is far from the truth, as he has just now gone mad. Like Faust, he believes that he is in obstinance of all the answers. This is far from the truth. He sees the enamor of the Bingo wheel as the power over the universe. Others see it as full an opportunity for fun and a subaltern money.These are the two separate earthly c at a timerns that the wheel inhabits. There is the world of reality, where the wheel is fair a game. Then there is the world that the Bingo King sees from his point of view. The world where he can become a god from winning this game and compulsory this wheel. This is a world he came to out of desperation and madness, struggling to get money and a job and not being able to find a place within the world of the story.This brings up the written report of Alienation. The Bingo King is upkeep in a world that has no place for him. He has no birth certificate. Hence, he does not exist. And seeing the fact that he does not exist, the world has no use for him anywhere. He cannot gain work in a factory for this reason or gain work anywhere else. To the world, he is obsolete. For that reason, other flock tend to abbreviate him.Examples of this are the people in the theater who do not even have it away that he exists until the Bingo Game. One woman is eating peanuts right in front of him. He recalls his time in his hometown where he could simply ask someone for a few peanuts and they would gladly give it to him. He realizes that the situation is different here. This is the big city. No one cares if he exists or not. This is the big city. If he asks the woman for peanuts in this theater, shell thin him, or tell him to get his own bag.This Alienation is not due to the simulation of his skin. It is not because his descendents were of an inferior race or because of any preconceived stereotypes about his people. This frenzy comes simply from the world he is living in now. Everyone is separate from each other. Everyone in the theater is separate. No one knows each other or has any real concern for each other. Their only concern is themselves and their own lives. All that is needed is to overindulge their own hungers or wants or needs. There is never a concern for their first m ate man or giving to others simply out of the joy of giving. All is meant for ones self.The joke of the Jackpot, however, is how small the pussycat very is. The Jackpot of 36.90, even for the forties, is a small amount. The Bingo king really has no hope of saving his wife through this game, nor does he have any hope of getting out of the beggary that he is currently suffering. Yet the game is giving him this false hope that it is possible. This is once again going to the authorship of desperation that is cast over him through his alienation. Bingo King has become so desperate, that he thinks he sees fortune where there is none.This is the overarching theme of the story. That society alienates itself from others an as a result, the people of that society sees little hope. In seeing little hope, they give their lives for a cause that may not seem altogether valiant. Sadly, in the end, this is the fate of the Bingo King.BibliographyMarlowe, Christopher. The sad History of Doctor Faustus. Oxford, EnglandOxford University Press, 1998.Ellison, Ralph. King of the Bingo Game. The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction.By Richard Bausch. New York Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc., 2005.