The National Gallery is the setting for a solitary visit in which Thelonious Ellison’s newfound money offers him leisure but not relief from his artistic doubts or thoughts of death. Looking at paintings, he tries to locate what matters beyond price, while the experience sharpens his awareness of how precarious his sense of purpose has become.

The Visit

One morning, Thelonious walks to McPherson Square, takes the Metro to the mall, and spends a couple of hours at the National Gallery. He eats lunch alone in the cafeteria and imagines having a life. His circumstances have changed: he has recently come into enough money to feel he need not teach for a while. He is unwilling to accept the low pay for a survey course at American, particularly for students he believes have little interest in Melville, Twain, or Hurston.

Art, Money, and Mortality

The visit is prompted by a desire to see something worth more than money, though Thelonious recognizes that not every work in the gallery merits that judgment. A Motherwell both attracts and offends him; a late Rothko holds his attention through its brushwork, dark colors, and white edges. Before the Rothko, thoughts of death become personal. The painting’s colors call up the contrast between his mother’s cream-colored skin and his own brown skin, and his reflections turn toward suicide and the despair beneath it.

Artistic Conflict and Significance

The gallery visit places Thelonious’s financial gain beside his unease about the novel he has sold. He does not regard the sale as a simple surrender of his artistic principles, but he is not going to refuse the check. At the same time, he contrasts the difficulty of articulating his approach to writing with the direct physical reality of woodworking: the wood’s feel, smell, and weight seem more real to him than words. The National Gallery thus marks a moment when looking at art cannot settle his conflict; it instead clarifies the distance between financial success, artistic conviction, and the despair he is struggling to contain.