Malcolm X_ A Life of Reinvention - Manning Marable [8]
Obviously, the analogy between the actor as performer and the political leader as performer goes only so far, but the art of reinvention in politics does demand the selective rearrangement of a public figure’s past lives (and the elimination of embarrassing episodes, as Bill Clinton has taught us). In Malcolm’s case, the memoirs written by friends and relatives have illustrated that the notorious outlaw Detroit Red character Malcolm presented in his autobiography is highly exaggerated. The actual criminal record of Malcolm Little for the years 1941–46 supports the contention that he deliberately built up his criminal history, weaving elements of his past into an allegory documenting the destructive consequences of racism within the U.S. criminal justice and penal system. Self-invention was an effective way for him to reach the most marginalized sectors of the black community, giving justification to their hopes.
My primary purpose in this book is to go beyond the legend: to recount what actually occurred in Malcolm’s life. I also present the facts that Malcolm himself could not know, such as the extent of illegal FBI and New York Police Department surveillance and acts of disruption against him, the truth about those among his supporters who betrayed him politically and personally, and the identification of those responsible for Malcolm’s assassination.
One of the greatest challenges I encountered in reconstructing his life was the attempt to examine his activities inside the Nation of Islam. Most popular treatments focus heavily on his public career during his final two years. Part of the problem in unearthing his earlier speeches and letters from the 1950s was that the current NOI leadership, headed by the former Louis X Walcott, known today as Louis Farrakhan, had never permitted scholars to examine the sect’s archives. After years of effort, I was able to initiate a dialogue with the Nation of Islam; in May 2005 I sat with Farrakhan for an extraordinary nine-hour meeting. The Nation subsequently made available to me fifty-year-old audiotapes of Malcolm’s sermons and lectures delivered while he was still Mosque No. 7’s leader, providing significant insights into his spiritual and political evolution. Veteran members also came forward to be interviewed, the most important of whom was Larry 4X Prescott, later known as Akbar Muhammad, a former assistant minister of Malcolm’s who had sided with Elijah Muhammad during the sect’s split in March 1964. These sources presented a perspective that had not been adequately represented before: the views of the Nation of Islam and its adherents.
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 learned that orthodox Islam was in many ways at odds with the racial stigmatization and intolerance at the center of the Nation of Islam’s creed. Malcolm came to adopt true Islam’s universalism, and its belief that all could find Allah’s grace regardless of race. Islam was also the spiritual platform from which he constructed a politics