Thelonious "Monk" Ellison

Thelonious “Monk” Ellison is the main character and first person narrator of the novel. In the opening paragraphs of Chapter 1, Monk introduces himself not only as a writer, but as “a son, a brother, a fisherman, an art lover, a woodworker” (1). He does so because he dislikes “any story which [has] as its main character a writer” (1). Monk’s disapproval of such stories and their writerly protagonists conveys his own self-doubt and frustration. Indeed, although Monk has published 16 novels, he has not achieved the kind of success that another author like Juanita Mae Jenkins has for her recent novel We’s Lives in Da Ghetto. Monk has always believed himself to be an intelligent and unique thinker and a skilled academic. However, he has also lived with “feelings of alienation and isolation” since he was a child (152). He struggles to get along with, and even to...