King of the Bingo Game

“King of the Bingo Game” is a highly symbolic story about the fate of African Americans in the United States. Though New York was not segregated by law under Jim Crow as Southern states were, New York enacted a number of voting and housing laws that restricted full participation of African Americans in the political process and prevented them from acquiring homes and wealth. Like many cities (though not all) in the North, New York was de facto segregated, meaning that Black Americans faced exclusion and violence if they violated the unspoken understanding that they were not to enter white mainstream society. In New York, antidiscrimination laws were not passed until the 1960s. Even though the story’s location is unspecified, the same discriminatory conditions prevailed in many cities in the North throughout the first half of the 20th century.

Themes of insanity, isolation, urban poverty, and desperation appear early and are developed throughout the story. The main character experiences intense feelings of shame and isolation, even among his fellow African Americans. Laura is depicted as the only person who understands and supports him, though she does not appear in the story. Their inability to afford her medical care may mean that she will not be with him much longer, leaving him completely alone in the world. The man on stage and the policemen are white, and both refer to him as “boy,” a racial slur meant to emasculate and humiliate Black men.

These pressurized circumstances drive the protagonist to experience an existential crisis. He feels that he has no control in his life. Moving to the North indicates that he is part of the Great Migration of African Americans who fled poverty and violence in the South under Jim Crow laws. In his case, the change has not been an improvement; he has been uprooted from the rural community where he felt most comfortable and has been thrown into an alien culture where cannot find work. He tries to take control through the bingo game; spinning the wheel himself represents his desire to control the forces that for so long have controlled him and generations of African Americans. Though he wins the jackpot, he cannot keep it because he has broken the game’s unspoken rules by his unwillingness to submit to fate or blind luck.

The protagonist is a fully realized character, but he is also symbolic because his experience represents that of generations of African Americans. Ellison makes this clear through the protagonist’s belief that all previous generations of African Americans share his experience. The wheel symbolizes the fate that none of them have had the power to control; the protagonist feels that his success or failure determines not only his outcome but also the outcome of his entire race. The idea that one African American’s actions represent the entire Black community is a prevalent theme in American society, which adds undue weight to the actions of a single individual.

The South is a double-edged sword for the protagonist. His nightmare of the train running off the tracks takes place in the South of his boyhood. The runaway train symbolizes danger, as do the white people jeering at him. Permanent dislocation is a theme that appears frequently in Ellison’s work. The South is home, but it is a place of extreme danger. The North is supposed to offer opportunity and safety, but in reality, it may offer neither. In Ellison’s work, African Americans face impossible choices, and even in taking action, they have limited ability to control their own fates.