The Autobiography of Malcolm X

[Freewheeling Andy]

[i guess I'm going to have to edit this down, and change it around, for the Penguin Blog thingy]

 

Malcolm X is one of those names that has a huge amount of legend built up around it. Yet, even as someone who is fairly politically aware, the substance of what Malcolm X did, or stood for, had largely passed me by, and he was merely "Some militant black power bloke who was killed in the 60s".

 

This book finally gets my head around a man who was really just a name before.

 

Interestingly, one of the most fascinating parts is in the intro by Alex Haley, who we would now describe as a ghost-writer. It explains the context of how the book came to be written, and therefore the changes in tone across the book. (The "serious introduction" for the Penguin Classics edition is turgid rubbish, as almost all the intros I've read in that series have been).

 

The book itself is really split into three parts. The first is Malcolm as a child, and then a hustler, living on the edge in post-depression America, making his way to New York. This is by far the most entertaining section, with a great narrative drive as Malcolm goes further and further off the rails, mixing with dodgier and dodgier characters. It's great fun, but it gives the context of Malcolm's race-politics, and also how he was able, unlike others, to motivate and move the urban blacks. Oddly, the book it feels closest to, in my mind, is Woody Guthrie's "Bound For Glory"(with a hint of Damon Runyan) in the mixture of poor boy heading out, of dangerous shady characters, of depression background, and the mix of obvious truth and perhaps slightly dubious myth-making.

 

The second part is Malcolm in prison, becoming part of the Nation of Islam, and his time creating most of the structure of that organisation, and preaching. This section of the book contains sections where, when talking to Haley, he obviously got distracted and went into "preacher" mode, describing the condition of the poor black man, and how he has to fight racist white America.

 

The final part comes with his split from the Nation, and his move to his final politics (before he was assassinated) - his travels abroad, and particularly his Hajj, where he saw the differences between Nation of Islam and orthodox Sunni Islam, and changed some of his more racist views for a more moderate position.

 

It's hard to separate the writing, which is largely Alex Haley transliterating Malcom's speaking fantastically clearly, from the narrative of Malcolm's life, which is utterly fascinating, from the politics which are contained within, most of which seem obsolete, and which carry nasty racial overtones, of racial separation. Even in the later chapters when he says he's seen white men being nice and he accepts them as brothers as long as they are not racist - he still advocates the African American (he continues to use the word Negro which is grating to the modern ear) to separate from the white man, and is apparently anti-integrationist; the same mentality that led to the atrocities of the "Black Homelands" in apartheid South Africa, for example.

 

What is perhaps most shocking about this for someone brought up in the UK in the 70s and 80s, is quite how racist, and how segregated, and how nasty the US was until really very recently; that it was less than a decade before I was born that there was still legally enforced segregation (let alone the still practised de facto segregation based on wealth).

 

Completely eye opening stuff, great social history, good narrative, and easy enough to read (apart from some of Malcolm's political rants).

[Roland Butter]

Sums it up perfectly, Andy.

 

I read it back in school (it wasn't on the curriculum! A lad in my football team who had a bit of a "Black Power" thing going on lent it to me). I'd always thought of myself as a bit of a liberal, but I'd never understood the true roots or the real meaning of the black consciousness movement.

 

I often wonder where Malcolm would have gone had he lived.

 

It's a good read for anyone interested in social or political history, but I agree with you - leave out the introduction and discover Malcolm for yourself

[Kylie]

Nice review Andy I saw this book at a fair recently and debated getting it, but didn't for some reason. Now I regret that I didn't pick it up! Sounds like an intriguing read and one that I will definitely add to my wish list. I've never known much about Malcolm X really; as you said, he's kind of just been a name to me, which sounds terrible, I know