The Autobiography of Malcolm X

by Malcolm X

judge had said years before when he was the N.A.A.C.P. chief attorney: “The Muslims are run by a bunch of thugs organized from prisons and jails and financed, I am sure, by some Arab group.”

Dr. Martin Luther King made that Malcolm X’s talk brought “misery upon Negroes.” Malcolm X exploded to me, “How in the hell can my talk do this? It’s always a Negro responsible, not what the white man does!”

“Yes, I’m an extremist. The black race here in North America is in extremely bad condition. You show me a black man who isn’t an extremist and I’ll show you one who needs psychiatric attention!”

‘Now, there’s a reporter who hasn’t taken a note in half an hour, but as soon as I start talking about the Jews, he’s busy taking notes to prove that I’m anti-Semitic’

But this was the kind of evidence which caused many close observers of the Malcolm X phenomenon to declare in absolute seriousness that he was the only Negro in America who could either start a race riot—or stop one. When I once quoted this to him, tacitly inviting his comment, he told me tartly, “I don’t know if I could start one. I don’t know if I’d want to stop one.”

A high percentage of white people were visibly uncomfortable in his presence, especially within the confines of small areas, such as in elevators. “I’m the only black man they’ve ever been close to who they know speaks the truth to them,” Malcolm X once explained to me. “It’s their guilt that upsets them, not me.” He said another time, “The white man is afraid of truth. The truth takes the white man’s breath and drains his strength—you just watch his face get red anytime you tell him a little truth.”

sotto-voced

I was someone he had learned he could express himself to, with candor, without the likelihood of hearing it repeated, and like any person who lived amid tension, he enjoyed being around someone, another man, with whom he could psychically relax.

“There’s an art to listening well,” he told me. “I listen closely to the sound of a man’s voice when he’s speaking. I can hear sincerity.”

I saw Malcolm X too many times exhilarated in after-lecture give-and-take with predominantly white student bodies at colleges and universities to ever believe that he nurtured at his core any blanket white-hatred. “The young whites, and blacks, too, are the only hope that America has,” he said to me once. “The rest of us have always been living in a lie.”

the man had charisma, and he had power. And I was not the only one who at various times marveled at how he could continue to receive such an awesome amount of international personal publicity and still season liberally practically everything he said, both in public and privately, with credit and hosannas to “The Honorable Elijah Muhammad.”

enigmatically,

however much Malcolm X praised Elijah Muhammad, it was upon dramatic, articulate Malcolm X that the communications media and hence the general public focused the great bulk of their attention.

“You have not converted a man because you have silenced him. John Viscount Morley.” And the same night, almost illegibly, “I was going downhill until he picked me up, but the more I think of it, we picked each other up.”

With the fast pace of newly developing incidents today, it is easy for something that is done or said tomorrow to be outdated even by sunset on the same day. Malcolm X.”

“One hundred years after the Civil War, and these chimpanzees get more recognition, respect and freedom in America than our people do.

“If I’m alive when this book comes out, it will be a miracle,” he said by way of explanation. “I’m not saying it distressingly—” He leaned forward and touched the buff gold bedspread. “I’m saying it like I say that’s a bedspread.”

“There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action. Goethe,”

one of the few times I ever heard his voice betray his hurt was when he said, “I felt like a blood big-brother to him.” He paused. “I’m not against him now. He’s a fine young man. Smart. He’s just let himself be used, led astray.”

“Children have a lesson adults should learn, to not be ashamed of failing, but to get up and try again. Most of us adults are so afraid, so cautious, so ‘safe,’ and therefore so shrinking and rigid and afraid that it is why so many humans fail. Most middle-aged adults have resigned themselves to failure.”

“I’m a marked man,” he said one day, after such a call. “I’ve had highly placed people tell me to be very careful every move I make.” He thought about it. “Just as long as my family doesn’t get hurt, I’m not frightened for myself.”

“I’m not a racist. I’m not condemning whites for being whites, but for their deeds. I condemn what whites collectively have done to our people collectively.”

“I hope the book is proceeding rapidly, for events concerning my life happen so swiftly, much of what has already been written can easily be outdated from month to month. In life, nothing is permanent; not even life itself (smile). So I would advise you to rush it on out as fast as possible.”

And the only thing that he ever indicated that he wished had been different in his life came when he was reading the chapter “Laura.” He said, “That was a smart girl, a good girl. She tried her best to make something out of me, and look what I started her into—dope and prostitution. I wrecked that girl.”

Malcolm X said to Beutel, “Only the unasked question is stupid,”

“You know,” he said once, “why I have been able to have some effect is because I make a study of the weaknesses of this country and because the more the white man yelps, the more I know I have struck a nerve.”

On the subject of politics he offered an enigma, “Whether you use bullets or ballots, you’ve got to aim well; don’t strike at the puppet, strike at the puppeteer.”

Bullet or ballot is a powerful statement

Evelyn Cunningham of the Pittsburgh Courier asked Malcolm X in a kidding way, “Say something startling for my column,” he told her, “Anyone who wants to follow me and my movement has got to be ready to go to jail, to the hospital, and to the cemetery before he can be truly free.”

layette

“Brother,” he said to me, “do you realize that some of history’s greatest leaders never were recognized until they were safely in the ground!”

a meeting of Negro intellectuals had agreed that Dr. Martin Luther King could secure the allegiance of the middle and upper classes of Negroes, but Malcolm X alone could secure the allegiance of Negroes at the bottom.

if Dr. King is convinced that he has sacrificed ten years of brilliant leadership, he will be forced to revise his concepts. There is only one direction in which he can move, and that is in the direction of Malcolm X.”

“What I want to stress is that I was trying to internationalize our problem,” he said to me, “to make the Africans feel their kinship with us Afro-Americans.

It seemed not in him to say “No” to such requests.

“this isn’t something I’m proud to say, but I don’t think I’ve ever bought one gift for my children. Everything they play with, either Betty got it for them, or somebody gave it to them, never me. That’s not good, I know it. I’ve always been too busy.”

“Tell him that he and all of the other moderate Negroes who are getting somewhere need to always remember that it was us extremists who made it possible.”

no one wanted to accept anything relating to him except “my old ‘hate’ and ‘violence’ image.” He said “the so-called moderate” civil-rights organizations avoided him as “too militant” and the “so-called militants” avoided him as “too moderate.” “They won’t let me turn the corner!” he once exclaimed, “I’m caught in a trap!”

I don’t think it should ever be put upon a black man, I don’t think the burden to defend any position should ever be put upon the black man, because it is the white man collectively who has shown that he is hostile toward integration and toward intermarriage and toward these other strides toward oneness.

“I just want to read it one more time,” he said, “because I don’t expect to read it in finished form.”

Addressing the mass meeting Malcolm X reportedly shouted: “I don’t advocate violence, but if a man steps on my toes, I’ll step on his.”…“Whites better be glad Martin Luther King is rallying the people because other forces are waiting to take over if he fails.”

Malcolm X reportedly shouted: “I don’t advocate violence, but if a man steps on my toes, I’ll step on his.”…“Whites better be glad Martin Luther King is rallying the people because other forces are waiting to take over if he fails.”

“My house was bombed by the Muslims!” And he hinted at revenge. “There are hunters; there are also those who hunt the hunters!”

“I’m man enough to tell you that I can’t put my finger on exactly what my philosophy is now, but I’m flexible.”

Parks asked him about police protection, and Malcolm X laughed, “Brother, nobody can protect you from a Muslim but a Muslim—or someone trained in Muslim tactics. I know. I invented many of those tactics.”

Something like this kills a lot of argument. I did many things as a Muslim that I’m sorry for now. I was a zombie then—like all Muslims—I was hypnotized, pointed in a certain direction and told to march. Well, I guess a man’s entitled to make a fool of himself if he’s ready to pay the cost. It cost me twelve years.”

the more I keep thinking about this thing, the things that have been happening lately, I’m not all that sure it’s the Muslims. I know what they can do, and what they can’t, and they can’t do some of the stuff recently going on. Now, I’m going to tell you, the more I keep thinking about what happened to me in France, I think I’m going to quit saying it’s the Muslims.”

The people who entered the ballroom were not searched at the door. In recent weeks, Malcolm X had become irritable about this, saying “It makes people uncomfortable” and that it reminded him of Elijah Muhammad. “If I can’t be safe among my own kind, where can I be?”

“In fact, I’m going to ease some of this tension by telling the black man not to fight himself—that’s all a part of the white man’s big maneuver, to keep us fighting among ourselves, against each other. I’m not fighting anyone, that’s not what we’re here for.”

“You’ll have to forgive me for raising my voice to you—I’m just about at my wit’s end.” “Oh, don’t mention it!” she said quickly, “I understand.” His voice sounded far away, “I wonder if anybody really understands—”

“The gentleman you know as Malcolm X is dead. He died from gunshot wounds. He was apparently dead before he got here. He was shot in the chest several times, and once in the cheek.”