Opening the envelope, the narrator finds that each envelope contains yet another envelope.
His grandfather orders him to open the briefcase and read the message contained in an official envelope stamped with the state seal. That night, the narrator dreams that he is at the circus with his grandfather, who refuses to laugh at the clowns. After enduring these humiliating experiences, the narrator is finally permitted to give his speech and receives his prize: a calfskin briefcase that contains a scholarship to the local college for Negroes (a term Ellison preferred over "blacks"). The entertainment includes an erotic dance by a naked blonde woman with a flag tattoo on her stomach, which he and his classmates are forced to watch.
When he arrived, he discovered that he was to provide part of the evening's entertainment for a roomful of drunken white men as a contestant, along with nine of his classmates, in a blindfolded boxing match (a "battle royal") before giving his speech. The narrator also recalls being invited to give his high school graduation speech at a gathering of the town's leading white citizens. The narrator relates an anecdote concerning his grandfather who, on his deathbed, shocks his family by revealing himself as a traitor and a spy (to his race). He remembers when he had not yet discovered his identity or realized that he was an invisible man.
The narrator - speaking in the voice of a man in his 40s - reminiscing about his youth, opens the novel.
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