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Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention [Hardcover]

Manning Marable
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (131 customer reviews)

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Book Description

April 4, 2011
Years in the making--the definitive biography of the legendary black activist.

Of the great figure in twentieth-century American history perhaps none is more complex and controversial than Malcolm X. Constantly rewriting his own story, he became a criminal, a minister, a leader, and an icon, all before being felled by assassins' bullets at age thirty-nine. Through his tireless work and countless speeches he empowered hundreds of thousands of black Americans to create better lives and stronger communities while establishing the template for the self-actualized, independent African American man. In death he became a broad symbol of both resistance and reconciliation for millions around the world.

Manning Marable's new biography of Malcolm is a stunning achievement. Filled with new information and shocking revelations that go beyond the Autobiography, Malcolm X unfolds a sweeping story of race and class in America, from the rise of Marcus Garvey and the Ku Klux Klan to the struggles of the civil rights movement in the fifties and sixties. Reaching into Malcolm's troubled youth, it traces a path from his parents' activism through his own engagement with the Nation of Islam, charting his astronomical rise in the world of Black Nationalism and culminating in the never-before-told true story of his assassination. Malcolm X will stand as the definitive work on one of the most singular forces for social change, capturing with revelatory clarity a man who constantly strove, in the great American tradition, to remake himself anew.

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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 608 pages
  • Publisher: Viking Adult; First Edition edition (April 4, 2011)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0670022209
  • ISBN-13: 978-0670022205
  • Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 7.2 x 1.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (131 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #70,083 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Editorial Reviews

Review

[A] groundbreaking piece of work. ...The result is not just a biography, but also a history of Muslims in America and a sweeping account of one man's transformation... It will be difficult for anyone to better this book. ... a work of art, a feast that combines genres skillfully: biography, true-crime, political commentary. It gives us Malcolm X in full gallop. -- Wil Haygood Washington Post [L]ucid, hugely researched and surely definitive...an extraordinary story. Sunday Times [A]n incredibly detailed account of Malcolm's life (and an investigation of his murder) and it is, of course, completely riveting...it is inevitably much more than a biography of one man... Marable is intensely and intimately sympathetic. -- Geoff Dyer New Yorker In the pantheon of black American protest figures only Martin Luther King occupies a more exalted position, but it is Malcolm X whose legend has the greater street credibility and aura of cool...Now, almost a half century [after his assassination], Malcolm has finally received the biography that his unique role in black culture demands...A meticulous, comprehensive, and fair-minded portrait. -- Andrew Anthony Observer Professor Manning Marable's Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention is encyclopaedic in its approach. The endnotes and bibliography indicate the staggering breadth and depth of scholarship underpinning this volume...Undoubtedly it will stand as a last lecture on the subject by one of America's most distinguished historians. -- Wilbert Rideau Financial Times [A] wealth of detail, some of it new, some of it old stories confirmed...At the end of it all, Malcolm X remains Malcolm X, for good or ill, one of the most fascinating historical figures of the 20th Century...a labour of love...a courageous endeavour. -- Hugh Muir Guardian Malcolm's short life (he was slain at 39) makes a fascinating story...Mr Marable has scoured contemporary press clippings in America, Europe and Africa...and benefitted...from the recent release to the public of hundreds of Malcolm's letters, photographs and texts of speeches. The Economist Marable gives us all the raw material for a harshly critical appraisal... Marable's is very far from the first biography of Malcolm, but it is undoubtedly the most penetrating and thoroughly researched. It clearly surpasses the best previous effort, Bruce Perry's 1991 study -- Stephen Howe The Independent By the end of the 1960s, Malcolm's disciples had elevated him to what Manning Marable, in this weighty biography, calls 'secular sainthood'; in death, his image was quickly refashioned to 'embody the very ideal of blackness for an entire generation'... But Marable... resists the temptation of hagiography and fills in the gaps left by previous books. Where the autobiography, carefully organised by the NOI-sceptic Haley, presents an idealised vision of a man's growth as a thinker, Marable gives us Malcolm in all his self-contradiction and self-doubt... By refusing to pin him down, he offers glimpses of the human being behind the legend. -- Yo Zushi New Statesman Striking... Marable is intensely sympathetic but always conscious of the contradictions of his subject...the fulfilment of a life's work -- Geoff Dyer, Books Of The Year Prospect From petty criminal to drug user to prisoner to minister to separatist to humanist to martyr. Marable, who worked for more than a decade on the book and died earlier this year, offers a more complete and unvarnished portrait of Malcolm X than the one found in his autobiography. The story remains inspiring -- 10 Best Books Of 2011 New York Times Selected by the New York Times as one of the 100 Notable Books of 2011 New York Times --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

About the Author

Manning Marable, Professor of History and director of the Institute for African-American Studies at Columbia University, has written features in the New York Times and the Nation. His books include Race, Reform, and Rebellion; Beyond Black and White; and Speaking Truth to Power. His public affairs commentary series, "Along the Color Line," is featured in more than 275 newspapers and is broadcast by eighty radio stations in the U.S. and internationally.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 608 pages
  • Publisher: Viking Adult; First Edition edition (April 4, 2011)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0670022209
  • ISBN-13: 978-0670022205
  • Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 7.2 x 1.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (131 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #70,083 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

This wonderful book is a great tribute to both Malcolm X and Manning Marable. New England Pat  |  27 reviewers made a similar statement
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
117 of 124 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Why you should read this book April 12, 2011
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Whether you're just getting to know this giant and enigmatic figure of the civil rights "movement" - or in Malcolm's case revolution - or you were on the street in the day, Manning Marable's biography is worth your valuable time. In addition to being a wide and deep examination of how Malcolm Little became Malcolm X and how Malcom X became a universal advocate for the oppressed, especially of African heritage, Marable fills in gaps with his singular access to records and sources, as well as his sustained effort over a decade in producing this biography. But, perhaps most importantly, the voice that Malcolm X raised in defense of those being oppressed carries a message especially important in our time. We should listen.

Marable examines Malcolm's life from many angles, in many contexts, which are necessary given that he manifested himself in appearances that ranged from hustler and angry voice from the ghetto to social activist and pragmatist willing to work within the American "system." And this broad appeal largely defines Malcolm X's appeal according to Marable: "Malcolm's journey of reinvention was in many ways centered on his lifelong quest to discern the meaning and substance of faith. As a prisoner, he embraced an antiwhite quasi-Islamic sect that nevertheless validated his fragmented sense of humanity and ethnic identity. But as he traveled across the world...Malcolm came to adopt true Islam's universalism, and its belief that all could find Allah's grace regardless of race." (p.12)

To black audiences, "what made him truly original was that he presented himself as the embodiment of the two central figures of African-American folk culture, simultaneously the hustler/trickster and the preacher/minister...
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90 of 106 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Manning Marable's book, Malcolm X, A Life of Reinvention, is an informative if unexciting read that adds important details to the story of the still-fascinating African-American revolutionary. Having read the famous Autobiography several times, I was still unaware, for example, at how much Malcolm travelled overseas, as well as his impact on foreign audiences. (Unfortunately, Mr. Marable's book plods exasperatingly in those chapters, as he includes far too much trivia. If you must know when Malcolm had a sandwich in Sussex or met 3 students at a Liberian airport, Marable has those details.) Information about Malcolm's rocky relationship with his powerful sister Ella, his troubled marriage and further details about the split with the Nation of Islam illuminate both the private and public figure. And the information about previous back to Africa groups is fascinating, as are the sections on Marcus Garvey and the formative days of the Nation of Islam. Marable is also insightful--if scathing, writing about Malcolm's co-author, Alex Haley. Marable's portrayal of Haley is a brutal picture of the free lancer as a sycophantic hustler.
Where Marable's runs into trouble is in his constant editorializing (he takes every opportunity to show exactly how much he disapproves of his subject's politics) and with some rather questionable lapses in logic and fact-gathering. I, for one, would have liked more information about the formation of the Nation of Islam's religious enforcement squads, the funding for Malcolm's foreign trips after the split with the NOI and what Marable was able to glean from police and government surveillance files. Marable makes some strong charges against those he feels were involved in the assassination and the charges are not always backed up with factual detail.
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33 of 38 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Important, but disturbing April 12, 2011
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I met Marable around 1999 when he spoke in Charleston SC. Very personable, even when we disagreed on the relevance of socialism (which be devoutly believed in at the time). So I eagerly awaited this and was filled with sorrow over Marable's death. The result is important, but with very disturbing implications.

Basically, in terms of Malcolmology, Marable picks up where Bruce Perry and Karl Evanzz left off. Marable does not get as deep into the armchair psychoanalysis of Malcolm as Bruce Perry did in his Malcolm bio, nor does he get as thick into the background of Elijah Muhammmad or Nation Of Islam founder Wallace Ford (aka W.D. Fard) as did Karl Evanzz. But Marable has the advantage of having Malcoolm's diary, actual papers, and interviews with previously untapped sources.

He somewhow managed to get Louis Farrakhan to be interviewed on Malcolm for this book. The former Calypso Gene does himself no favors. Farrakhan admits to some of the brutality of the old NOI, tells a cock-and-bull tale of a dream in which M/X supposedly spoke to him in 2007 (did he realize that no one outside of his following would believe such a convenient story?), and admits tattling the tale of Malcolm's spreading stories of Elijah Muhammad's adultery to Elijah himself, which began the downward sprial leading to M/X's murder. Farrakhan also surpringly claims that the reason M/X went buck wild over the story of Elijah's out of wedlock children was because one of Malcolm's former lovers was involved-and further alleges that M/X told him that he wanted to see this former lover behind his wife Betty's back! Given the penchant for secrecy in the NOI, why would Farrakhan publicly admit to something like this? Marable of course mentions Farrakhan's infamous statement on M/X in Dec.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars Malcolm X: A life of reinvention
I read Alex Haley's book years ago. This book appears to be mora objective and clear-eyed. Gandi, Ernesto Guevara, Malcolm, John Adams, Jefferson are all very interestng character... Read more
Published 17 hours ago by Mirian
4.0 out of 5 stars Open your mind to Malcolm
If the Autobiography intrigued you or raised questions in your mind, read this stimulating engagement into African American thinking and racism in the USA. Read more
Published 5 days ago by Mr. Walter Mack
5.0 out of 5 stars Malcolm X
The book was in great condition and met all my expectations. I would order again if a book I need is available.
Published 7 days ago by Robert Djed Snead
5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Read
I thought the Autobiography of Malcolm X was a wonderful book. I think this is much, much better. After I finished it, I decided to send Mr. Read more
Published 19 days ago by Leslie C. Smith
4.0 out of 5 stars Manning Marable, a professor of history at Columbia University and...
The Marable biography, setting itself apart from some of the other biographies, reveals information from previously unavailable interviews, confidential police reports as well as... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Troy Johnson
5.0 out of 5 stars Malcolm x: A Life of Reinvention
Malcolm's: A Life Reinvention
Excellent book written about Malcolm X.enjoyable books.highly advice to read this books. Very enjoyable
Gulam Kolia.
Published 2 months ago by Gulam Mohmed Kolia
4.0 out of 5 stars Well-researched, but annoying innuendo.
In Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, Manning Marable set out to honestly portray a man and to humanize an icon. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Rachel
5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting reading
This book was very informative. It shed a lot of light on Malcolm X. Recommended for progressive readers and those curious about the nation of Islam.
Published 2 months ago by Ann Burns
5.0 out of 5 stars An interesting journey
Until I read the Autobiography, Malcolm X was a vague, shadowy figure. That's to be expected, I suppose. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Bob Probasco
5.0 out of 5 stars Very good book
I never really read or knew much about Malcolm X so I found this book to be very interesting and informative. I would recommend it to anyone interested in Civil Rights or the 60s.
Published 2 months ago by Tor-dizzle
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Manning Marable, Historian and Social Critic, Dies at 60
I read that on google, at least he was able to finish the book though. RIP.
Apr 3, 2011 by Susie |  See all 2 posts
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