Chapter 31 - Reception of the Hickman Novel

Summary

This chapter will survey the critical reception of Ellison’s second novel from the time its first excerpt was published as a short story in 1960. It will explore critical responses to the excerpts Ellison published (1960-78), to Juneteenth (1999), and to Three Days Before the Shooting... (2010), taking note of dissenting and celebratory approaches in literary media, while taking stock of scholarly trends and important scholarly articles. This chapter will approach Ellison’s post-Invisible Man fiction—an archive unto itself—in terms germane to understanding Ellison’s cultural vision and humanistic project, delineating lines of thought that recognize its puzzle-like qualities as well as its mediation on American racial history.