Griffin (The Invisible Man) Griffin (The Invisible Man) Dr. Griffin is the main protagonist, also known as The Invisible Man, who appears as the title character in H. G. Wells' 1897 science fiction novella "The Invisible Man". In the original novel, Griffin is a scientist whose research in optics and experiments into changing the human body's refractive index to that of air results in his becoming invisible. The character has become iconic, particularly in horror fiction, and versions and variations have appeared throughout various media. Griffin is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a formula for making a human being invisible. The formula entails
Invisible Man in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005, calling it "the quintessential American picaresque of the 20th century", rather than a "race novel, or even a bildungsroman". Malcolm Bradbury and Richard Ruland recognize an existential vision with a "Kafka-like absurdity". According to "The New York Times", former U.S. president Barack Obama modeled his memoir "Dreams from My Father" on Ellison's novel. Ellison says in his introduction to the 30th Anniversary Edition that he started to write what would eventually become Invisible Man in a barn in Waitsfield, Vermont in the summer of 1945 while on sick leave