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92 pages 3 hours read

Malcolm X, Alex Haley

The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 1965

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Key Figures

Malcolm X

Born Malcolm Little in 1925, Malcolm X was a human rights activist whose legacy continues to inform modern civil rights and racial justice movements. When Malcolm was four, the Midwestern anti-Black terrorist group Black Legion burned down his family’s house. Two years later, the same group murdered and mutilated Malcolm’s father Earl, a Pan-African Baptist minister, leaving Malcolm keenly aware of the existential threat posed by White supremacy.

Tall, red-haired, and relatively light-skinned, Malcolm had a complex relationship with Blackness from an early age. As the only Black person in his class in junior high, Malcolm thrived socially and academically, but felt like a “mascot”—well liked but ultimately disrespected. In eighth grade, in what Malcolm characterized as a crucial turning point in his life, his seemingly supportive English teacher told him it was “unrealistic” for him to want to be a lawyer because he was Black.

Malcolm struggled to resist what he later termed White supremacist “brainwashing” that enforced a lack of Black pride. Only in prison did Malcolm fully reject internalized White supremacist ideas through his discovery of the Nation of Islam. For the next 12 years, Malcolm angrily and eloquently spread the organization’s teachings, which included a belief in the superiority of Black people and the rejection of White people as “devils.” As Malcolm’s profile in the national media grew, jealous elements near the top of the Nation of Islam’s organization worked to sabotage him.

In early 1964, Malcolm, effectively cut out of the Nation of Islam, made the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. There, the sight of Sunni Muslims from all races and ethnicities coming together in the name of Allah genuinely affected him. From then on, Malcolm was far more open to the idea of Black and White Americans coexisting, and to acknowledging White antiracist allies, although he still barred from them from his Black human rights organization.

On February 21, 1965, members of the Nation of Islam shot Malcolm to death during a rally in Manhattan. Debates continue to this day as to the specific identities of the gunmen and the complicity of larger institutional forces in his death, including the Nation of Islam’s leadership, the FBI, and the NYPD. Although Malcolm adopted many belief systems over the course of his life, and although his philosophy at the end of his life was flexible and unsettled, Malcolm left a legacy of celebrating Black personhood that never backs down from the threat and influence of White supremacy.

Alex Haley

Alex Haley was an American journalist who collaborated with Malcolm on his autobiography. When he met Malcolm in 1960, Haley, an editor at Reader’s Digest, was writing an article about the Nation of Islam. Appreciating the fair and evenhanded article, Malcolm enlisted Haley to help him write an autobiography. According to their contract, Haley would print nothing except Malcolm’s own words, and Malcolm’s would have approval over the final published work. In return, Haley demanded to append an Epilogue to the book, in which he could write anything he wanted.

In that Epilogue, Haley describes his contributions to the collaboration. In addition to convincing Malcolm to talk about his mother for the first time in years, Haley persuaded Malcolm to preserve his initial effusive praise of the Nation of Islam, despite having broken with the organization by the time the book was finished. Haley believed that Malcolm’s transformation from a proudly atheist, drug-addicted burglar into a rigid follower of the Nation of Islam would be more convincing and compelling to readers that way.

Haley is an invisible hand guiding Malcolm as he tells his story. Haley’s voice is subdued and journalistic. The only opinion of his interview subject he shares is his belief that Malcolm’s antipathy toward Whites was never all encompassing—not even at the height of his involvement with the Nation of Islam. Haley also acknowledges the respect Malcolm had for Martin Luther King, Jr., before and after his split with the Nation of Islam.

In 1976, Haley wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Roots, which traced his family history back to the Gambia in 1767, when his ancestor was kidnapped and trafficked to America as an enslaved person. Haley adapted the book into a television miniseries that aired with record-breaking ratings.

Elijah Muhammad

Born Elijah Poole in 1897, Elijah Muhammad was the leader of the Nation of Islam from 1934 to 1975. Soft-spoken and slight of build, Elijah studied under Wallace Fard Muhammad, who in founding the Nation of Islam wedded Black nationalism to Islam, developing a detailed mythology around the origins of Black civilization and the later creation of a race of White “devils.” When Wallace Fard Muhammad disappeared in 1934, Elijah took over the organization, naming himself the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah.

Malcolm first heard of Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam while incarcerated. He corresponded with Elijah Muhammad, who upon Malcolm’s release invited him to Chicago. Thus began a ten-year partnership during which Malcolm spoke on Elijah Muhammad’s behalf to followers, prospective recruits, the media, and on college campuses.

As Malcolm gained national recognition, a schism formed between him and Elijah Muhammad. Members of Elijah Muhammad’s inner circle who envied Malcolm’s growing power both inside and outside the organization encouraged the schism. However, the split was also rooted in Elijah Muhammad’s own resentment, particularly around Malcolm’s speaking engagements on college campuses, where Elijah Muhammad always felt uncomfortable because of his lack of formal education.

These resentments boiled over when Malcolm confronted Elijah Muhammad about Muhammad’s extramarital affairs and subsequent paternity suits with former Nation of Islam secretaries. Once out of the organization, Malcolm publicly criticized Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam, causing Elijah Muhammad to make implicit death threats toward Malcolm. Five days after Malcolm’s assassination at the hands of Nation of Islam gunmen, Muhammad told his followers, “We didn’t want to kill Malcolm and didn’t try to kill him. They know I didn’t harm Malcolm. They know I loved him. His foolish teaching brought him to his own end” (517).

The authorities never connected Malcolm’s shooters to Elijah Muhammad or any other Nation of Islam leaders, though many observers believe the investigation was hastily conducted and closed prematurely. Elijah Muhammad died of heart failure ten years later at age 77.

Betty X/Betty Shabazz

Betty X—later named Betty Shabazz after she split from the Nation of Islam—was Malcolm’s wife from 1958 until his assassination in 1965. A nursing student at New York’s Montefiore Hospital, Betty became interested in the Nation of Islam after facing dehumanizing racist treatment from Whites, both in Alabama, where she attended college, and in New York. The racism particularly startled her because her adoptive parents did everything they could to shelter Betty from White supremacy in her youth.

After joining Harlem’s Temple Number Seven in 1956, Betty delivered weekly lectures to Muslim girls and women on hygiene and health. Malcolm at first resisted his intellectual and physical attraction to her, believing that romance would stand in the way of his spiritual journey. Unable to go on traditional dates because of the Nation of Islam’s code of conduct, Malcolm proposed to her over the phone. Betty endured Malcolm’s frequent trips and attacks on her family by suspected Nation of Islam members. When Malcolm returned from Mecca having renamed himself El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, Betty changed her surname to Shabazz. Malcolm tells Haley, “I guess by now I will say I love Betty. She’s the only woman ever even thought about loving. And she’s one of the very few—four women—whom I have ever trusted” (267).

After Malcolm’s assassination, Betty remained a Muslim, making the Hajj pilgrimage herself in March of 1965. She later earned her education degree and served on an advisory committee for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. She also became involved in numerous civil rights organizations including the NAACP and the National Urban League.

In 1997, at the age of 63, Betty died from burn injuries suffered after her grandson Malcolm set fire to her home. Malcolm was in Betty’s custody while his mother Qubilah—Malcolm and Betty’s second daughter—underwent treatment for drug and alcohol abuse, following her attempts to hire an assassin to kill Louis Farrakhan—formerly Louis X—for his alleged involvement in her father’s murder.

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