The Autobiography of Malcolm X is an autobiography written by Muslim American minister and activist Malcolm X in collaboration with American journalist Alex Haley. It was released posthumously on October 29, 1965, nine months after his assassination. Haley coauthored the book based on a series of in-depth interviews he conducted between 1963 and 1965. The Autobiography is a religious conversion narrative which outlines Malcolm X's philosophy of Black pride, Black nationalism, and pan-Africanism. After Malcolm X was killed, Haley wrote the book's epilogue, which describes their collaborative process and the events at the end of Malcolm's life.
While Malcolm X and scholars contemporary to its publication regarded Haley as the book's ghostwriter, modern scholars tend to regard him as an essential collaborator who intentionally muted his authorial voice in order to create the effect of Malcolm X speaking directly to readers. Haley influenced some of Malcolm X's stylistic choices. For example, Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam during the period when he was working on the book with Haley. Rather than rewriting earlier chapters as a polemic against the Nation, which Malcolm X had rejected, Haley persuaded him to favor a style of "suspense and drama". According to biographer Manning Marable, "Haley was particularly worried about what he viewed as Malcolm X's anti-Semitism" and rewrote material to eliminate it.
When the Autobiography was published, The New York Times reviewer Eliot Fremont-Smith described it as a "brilliant, painful, important book". In 1967, historian John William Ward wrote that it would become a classic American autobiography. In 1998, Time named The Autobiography of Malcolm X as one of ten "required reading" nonfiction books. James Baldwin and Arnold Perl adapted the book as a screenplay, which later provided the source material for Spike Lee's 1992 film Malcolm X.
Summary Published posthumously, The Autobiography of Malcolm X is an account of the life of Malcolm X, born Malcolm Little (1925–1965), who became a human rights activist. Beginning with his mother's pregnancy, the book describes Malcolm's childhood first in Omaha, Nebraska and then in the area around Lansing and Mason, Michigan, the death of his father under questionable circumstances, and his mother's deteriorating mental health that resulted in her commitment to a psychiatric hospital.. X's young adulthood in Boston and New York City is covered, as well as his involvement in organized crime. This led to his arrest and subsequent eight- to ten-year prison sentence, of which he served six-and-a-half years (1946–1952).. The book addresses his ministry with Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam (1952–1963) and his emergence as the organization's national spokesman. It documents his disillusionment with and departure from the Nation of Islam in March 1964, his pilgrimage to Mecca, which catalyzed his conversion to orthodox Sunni Islam, and his travels in Africa.. Malcolm X was assassinated in New York's Audubon Ballroom in February 1965, before the book was finished. His co-author, the journalist Alex Haley, summarizes the last days of Malcolm X's life, and describes in detail their working agreement, including Haley's personal views on his subject, in the Autobiographys epilogue.Als, Hilton, "Philosopher or Dog?", in ; Wideman, John Edgar, "Malcolm X: The Art of Autobiography", in .
Genre
The Autobiography is a spiritual conversion narrative that outlines Malcolm X's philosophy of black pride, black nationalism, and pan-Africanism.; Kelley, Robin D. G., "The Riddle of the Zoot: Malcolm Little and Black Cultural Politics During World War II", in . Literary critic Arnold Rampersad and Malcolm X biographer Michael Eric Dyson agree that the narrative of the Autobiography resembles the Augustinian approach to confessional narrative. Augustine's Confessions and The Autobiography of Malcolm X both relate the early hedonistic lives of their subjects, document deep philosophical change for spiritual reasons, and describe later disillusionment with religious groups their subjects had once revered.Rampersad, Arnold, "The Color of His Eyes: Bruce Perry's Malcolm and Malcolm's Malcolm", in ; . Haley and autobiographical scholar Albert E. Stone compare the narrative to the Icarus myth.; . Author Paul John Eakin and writer Alex Gillespie suggest that part of the Autobiographys rhetorical power comes from "the vision of a man whose swiftly unfolding career had outstripped the possibilities of the traditional autobiography he had meant to write",Eakin, Paul John, "Malcolm X and the Limits of Autobiography", in . thus destroying "the illusion of the finished and unified personality".Gillespie, Alex, "Autobiography and Identity", in .
In addition to functioning as a spiritual conversion narrative, The Autobiography of Malcolm X also reflects generic elements from other distinctly American literary forms, from the Puritan conversion narrative of Jonathan Edwards and the secular self-analyses of Benjamin Franklin, to the African American slave narratives. This aesthetic decision on the part of Malcolm X and Haley also has profound implications for the thematic content of the work, as the progressive movement between forms that is evidenced in the text reflects the personal progression of its subject. Considering this, the editors of the Norton Anthology of African American Literature assert that, "Malcolm's Autobiography takes pains to interrogate the very models through which his persona achieves gradual self-understanding...his story's inner logic defines his life as a quest for an authentic mode of being, a quest that demands a constant openness to new ideas requiring fresh kinds of expression."
Construction
Haley coauthored The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and also performed the basic functions of a ghostwriter and biographical amanuensis,. writing, compiling, and editing. the Autobiography based on more than 50 in-depth interviews he conducted with Malcolm X between 1963 and his subject's 1965 assassination.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in ; Rampersad, "The Color of His Eyes", in . The two first met in 1959, when Haley wrote an article about the Nation of Islam for Reader's Digest, and again when Haley interviewed Malcolm X for Playboy in 1962..
In 1963 the Doubleday publishing company asked Haley to write a book about the life of Malcolm X. American writer and literary critic Harold Bloom writes, "When Haley approached Malcolm with the idea, Malcolm gave him a startled look ..." Haley recalls, "It was one of the few times I have ever seen him uncertain." After Malcolm X was granted permission from Elijah Muhammad, he and Haley commenced work on the Autobiography, a process which began as two-and three-hour interview sessions at Haley's studio in Greenwich Village. Bloom writes, "Malcolm was critical of Haley's middle-class status, as well as his Christian beliefs and twenty years of service in the U.S. Military."
When work on the Autobiography began in early 1963, Haley grew frustrated with Malcolm X's tendency to speak only about Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam. Haley reminded him that the book was supposed to be about Malcolm X, not Muhammad or the Nation of Islam, a comment which angered Malcolm X. Haley eventually shifted the focus of the interviews toward the life of his subject when he asked Malcolm X about his mother:.
I said, "Mr.Malcolm, could you tell me something about your mother?" And I will never, ever forget how he stopped almost as if he was suspended like a marionette. And he said, "I remember the kind of dresses she used to wear. They were old and faded and gray." And then he walked some more. And he said, "I remember how she was always bent over the stove, trying to stretch what little we had." And that was the beginning, that night, of his walk. And he walked that floor until just about daybreak.
Though Haley is ostensibly a ghostwriter on the Autobiography, modern scholars tend to treat him as an essential and core collaborator who acted as an invisible figure in the composition of the work.Leak, Jeffery B., "Malcolm X and black masculinity in process", in ; Wideman, "Malcolm X", in . He minimized his own voice, and signed a contract to limit his authorial discretion in favor of producing what looked like verbatim copy.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in . Manning Marable considers the view of Haley as simply a ghostwriter as a deliberate narrative construction of black scholars of the day who wanted to see the book as a singular creation of a dynamic leader and martyr. Marable argues that a critical analysis of the Autobiography, or the full relationship between Malcolm X and Haley, does not support this view; he describes it instead as a collaboration.
Haley's contribution to the work is notable, and several scholars discuss how it should be characterized.Terrill, Robert E., "Introduction" in, , Gillespie, "Autobiography and Identity", in ; Norman, Brian, "Bringing Malcolm X to Hollywood", in ; Leak, "Malcolm X and black masculinity in process", in In a view shared by Eakin, Stone and Dyson, psychobiographical writer Eugene Victor Wolfenstein writes that Haley performed the duties of a quasi-psychoanalytic Freudian psychiatrist and spiritual confessor..See also Eakin, "Malcolm X and the Limits of Autobiography", in ; ; . Gillespie suggests, and Wolfenstein agrees, that the act of self-narration was itself a transformative process that spurred significant introspection and personal change in the life of its subject.Gillespie, "Autobiography and identity", in ; .
Haley exercised discretion over content,. guided Malcolm X in critical stylistic and rhetorical choices,. and compiled the work.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in ; Rampersad, "The Color of His Eyes", in . In the epilogue to the Autobiography, Haley describes an agreement he made with Malcolm X, who demanded that: "Nothing can be in this book's manuscript that I didn't say and nothing can be left out that I want in it.". As such, Haley wrote an addendum to the contract specifically referring to the book as an "as told to" account. In the agreement, Haley gained an "important concession": "I asked for—and he gave—his permission that at the end of the book I could write comments of my own about him which would not be subject to his review." These comments became the epilogue to the Autobiography, which Haley wrote after the death of his subject.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in .
Narrative presentation In "Malcolm X: The Art of Autobiography", writer and professor John Edgar Wideman examines in detail the narrative landscapes found in biography. Wideman suggests that as a writer, Haley was attempting to satisfy "multiple allegiances": to his subject, to his publisher, to his "editor's agenda", and to himself.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in . Haley was an important contributor to the Autobiographys popular appeal, writes Wideman.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in . Wideman expounds upon the "inevitable compromise" of biographers, and argues that in order to allow readers to insert themselves into the broader socio-psychological narrative, neither coauthor's voice is as strong as it could have been.Wideman, "Malcolm X", in . Wideman details some of the specific pitfalls Haley encountered while coauthoring the Autobiography: