The Afterlife of Malcolm X - by Mark Whitaker (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Published to coincide with the hundredth anniversary of his birth, the first major study of Malcolm X's influence in the sixty years since his assassination, exploring his enduring impact on culture, politics, and civil rights.

Malcolm X has become as much of an American icon as Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, or Martin Luther King. But when he was murdered in 1965, he was still seen as a dangerous outsider. White America found him alienating, mainstream African Americans found him divisive, and even his admirers found him bravely radical. Although Ossie Davis famously eulogized Malcolm X as "our own Black shining prince," he never received the mainstream acceptance toward which he seemed to be striving in his final year. It is more in death than his life that Malcolm's influence has blossomed and come to leave a deep imprint on the cultural landscape of America.

With impeccable research and original reporting, Mark Whitaker tells the story of Malcolm X's far-reaching posthumous legacy. It stretches from founders of the Black Power Movement such as Stokely Carmichael and Huey Newton to hip-hop pioneers such as Public Enemy and Tupac Shakur. Leaders of the Black Arts and Free Jazz movements from Amiri Baraka to Maya Angelou, August Wilson, and John Coltrane credited their political awakening to Malcolm, as did some of the most influential athletes of our time, from Muhammad Ali to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and beyond. Spike's movie biopic and the Black Lives Matter movement reintroduced Malcolm to subsequent generations. Across the political spectrum, he has been cited as a formative influence by both Barack Obama--who venerated Malcolm's "unadorned insistence on respect"--and Clarence Thomas, who was drawn to Malcolm's messages of self-improvement and economic self-help.

In compelling new detail, Whitaker also retraces the long road to exoneration for two men wrongfully convicted of Malcolm's murder, making The Afterlife of Malcolm X essential reading for anyone interested in true crime, American politics, culture, and history.

Review Quotes

"Apart from providing a fascinating detective story, Whitaker documents the sometimes surprising ways in which Malcolm X remains a model of Black resistance--as, for example, an opera that "became a vehicle for making Malcolm newly relevant to the 'Black Panther' generation," as well as the renewed interest in him with the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. A complex, thoughtfully written book that ably lives up to its title."--Kirkus (Starred Review)

"Malcolm X still haunts and inspires this nation -- in ways we often fail to understand. Now, finally, Mark Whitaker puts together the missing puzzle pieces to present a full and mesmerizing picture of the man's life and legacy. The Afterlife of Malcolm X is an indispensable work that sheds new light on American society and of its most compelling figures." -- Jonathan Eig, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning King

"Whitaker traces the vast streaks of light left by 'our black shining prince' across space and time since the shock of his cruel and brutal murder at the Audubon Ballroom in New York in February 1965. The lives Malcolm X has touched, generation to generation, from Eldridge Cleaver to Amiri Baraka, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Spike Lee, Public Enemy to Black Lives Matter, make for an impressive and wide-ranging cultural history. At the same time, Whitaker reveals the stories of reporters and filmmakers who have dedicated themselves to finding justice not only for Malcolm but for those who did and did not take his life. His legacy lives on."--Henry Louis Gates Jr., New York Times bestselling author of The Black Church

"Whitaker's deeply researched and astonishingly revelatory biography, explains Malcolm's eloquent endurance: 'he grabbed on to my frustrations and turned them into logic.' Whitaker's biography is true to its protagonist."--David Levering Lewis, Pulitzer-prize winning author of W.E.B. Du Bois

"A fine piece of historical writing and reporting about the changing memory of Malcolm X and its impact on modern America. A must-read for anyone interested in the cultural politics of civil rights since the 1960s."--Julian E. Zelizer, New York Times bestselling author of Myth America

"With deep insight and intellectual rigor Mark Whitaker chronicles the at times paradoxical evolution of Malcom X's legacy in popular and political culture. A major achievement."--Peniel Joseph, award-winning author of The Sword and the Shield

About the Author

Mark Whitaker was born outside of Philadelphia, raised by a single mother in southeastern Massachusetts, and attended Harvard College and Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar. He worked for twenty-five years at Newsweek, rising to become the magazine's first African American top editor (1998-2006). Subsequently, Whitaker worked in television news as Washington Bureau Chief for NBC News and Managing Editor of CNN Worldwide. He is currently an Emmy Award-winning Contributing Correspondent for CBS Sunday Morning. Whitaker's first book, My Long Trip Home, was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and he has since written four more books. He is a judge for the Peabody Awards, the John Chancellor Award, and was previously a juror for the duPont/Columbia Awards. Mark Whitaker is married with two adult children and resides in Manhattan and Woodstock, New York.