With the publication of his novel Invisible Man in 1952, Ralph Ellison became a widely acclaimed author who is considered among the most important writers of the century. In addition to this novel, he published two collections of essays, Shadow and Act (1964) and Going to the Territory (1986) and throughout his life, he was a frequent contributor to literary and political journals including New Masses, Nation, and American Review. After his death, Juneteenth, a novel he had been working on for many years but had not completed, was edited and published posthumously in 1998.

Ellison was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, in 1914 and was named by his father after Ralph Waldo Emerson, the famous American transcendentalist writer of the nineteenth century. His father died when Ellison was four years old, and Ellison and his younger brother were raised by their mother who made sure her children had plenty to challenge them...