The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley (Overview)

This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" by Malcolm X and Alex Haley. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.

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What do you know about Malcolm X? How did he rise to leadership? What legacy did he leave?

The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley explains how Malcolm X rose from a life of poverty and crime to become a significant leader in the civil rights movement. It provides insights into his fascinating life and explores how his beliefs changed over time.

Continue reading for an overview of The Autobiography of Malcolm X.

Overview of The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Malcolm X was a controversial figure—his views were often considered extreme, and they changed radically throughout his life. In telling his life story, Malcolm X explains why he believed what he believed—and why he fought stalwartly for racial justice, even though he knew it would lead to his death.

Published in 1965, The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley was written by Malcolm X and Haley. Haley was a journalist and author of the novel Roots, which later became a record-breaking television series. Haley recorded interviews with Malcolm X, minimally edited the transcripts, and compiled them into an autobiography—which means the autobiography is given in Malcolm X’s own words. (Shortform note: For that reason, we’ll refer to Malcolm X as the sole author until we discuss his death and legacy—information that Haley provided himself.)

In Malcolm X’s Early Life Was Marred by Racism, we’ll explain how a childhood full of anti-Black racial terrorism and economic violence culminated with Malcolm X spending time as a young adult in prison.
In The Nation of Islam Gave Malcolm X a Second Chance, we’ll discuss how and why Malcolm X converted to a unique brand of Islam and how his religion led him to become a civil rights activist.
In A Pilgrimage to Mecca Opened Malcolm X’s Eyes, we’ll explore why Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam and how a visit to Mecca changed his religious and political views.
In Malcolm X’s Death and Legacy, we’ll discuss the circumstances surrounding Malcolm X’s murder and his legacy.

Malcolm X’s Early Life Was Marred by Racism

Malcolm X believed that the racism he experienced throughout his childhood to adolescence determined the path he would take as an adult. We’ll explain how racist violence and structural inequality destabilized and discouraged a young Malcolm X—and ultimately led him to spend time in prison.

Racism Destabilized and Discouraged Him

Malcolm X explains that he was born Malcolm Little on May 19, 1925, in Omaha, Nebraska. (Shortform note: He eventually dropped “Little” and changed his name to Malcolm X, but we’ll still refer to him as Malcolm X.)

From the time he was born, his family was constantly being threatened by racists, in part because his father, Earl Little, was associated with Marcus Garvey’s Back-to-Africa movement, which argued that Black Americans must move to Africa to attain dignity and self-determination. As a result, the family moved often; eventually, they settled in Lansing, Michigan.

When Malcolm X was six, his father died, and the family suffered tremendously because Little had been the sole breadwinner and the Great Depression was on. His death was ruled a suicide, but his family and community believed racists had murdered him. The family received some welfare and Malcolm X’s mother, Louise Little, tried to work, but the racism she encountered made it hard for her to keep a job. She was multiracial and appeared white, but, when employers eventually found out that she was Black, they fired her. Malcolm X recalls that he began stealing food at this point.

Under incredible strain trying to keep the family together, Malcolm X’s mother struggled with her mental health and eventually became incapable of caring for her children. The state removed them and committed her to a psychiatric hospital. Upon reflection, Malcolm X believed that his mother lost her children and her mental health because the state didn’t give her enough help—and he asserts that this ordeal was equivalent to slavery since white people with greater social power ended up with custody of a Black woman’s children.

For a while, Malcolm X lived with a family he knew, but after he got into some trouble at school, he was expelled and sent to live at a juvenile detention facility run by white people, whom he says were nice but treated him as less-than-human because he was Black. He was enrolled in school where he was one of only a few Black students and was at the top of his class. However, one of his teachers told him that regardless of how intelligent and likable he was, he would never be able to attain a professional career because he was Black—he was only suited for manual labor. He explains that this made him feel discouraged and indignant about racism; as a result, he stopped putting in effort at school.

By this time, Malcolm X had already met his older sister Ella—his father’s daughter from a previous marriage—and stayed a summer with her in Roxbury (a neighborhood of Boston). This stay had a huge impact on him because Roxbury was a thriving Black cultural center—Malcolm X explains that it was the first time he was exposed to such a magnitude of Black success. After the incident with his teacher left him feeling defeated, he asked Ella if he could live with her—she agreed, and he moved there after eighth grade.

Racism Limited His Options to Crime

Ella encouraged Malcolm X to get to know the nice parts and people of Roxbury, but he was drawn to the ghetto. In the ghetto, he befriended a man named Shorty, who helped him get a job as a shoeshiner at a nearby ballroom. Eventually, he moved in with Shorty—partially because Malcolm X started dating a white girl named Sophia, which Ella didn’t like. He explains that hanging out with Shorty and his friends changed him in a few ways: He started to gamble, drink, and smoke cigarettes and marijuana. He also learned how to dress and talk as they did in the city.

Malcolm X had a few different jobs and eventually landed a gig as a cook on a train. At first, he excelled at this job because, he explains, he acted like an “Uncle Tom”—a Black person extremely devoted to serving white people. The train sometimes took him to Harlem, and the more time he spent there, the more he loved it and the more uninhibited he became in his interactions with white people. It showed in his work, and ultimately he was fired for being disrespectful to passengers. At 17, he moved to Harlem to work at a nightclub called Small’s Paradise.

From his customers at Small’s Paradise, Malcolm X learned more about Harlem’s history—how it came to be an all-Black area and why it seemed to cater to whites anyway (it was the Harlem Renaissance, a period of Black cultural enrichment, and white people enjoyed consuming Black entertainment). He also learned about the rules of hustling—making money through illicit means—from his customers, especially those few who were involved in the underground crime scene. Malcolm X explains that the criminals he knew became criminals because white society deprived them of the opportunity to fulfill their true potential—they turned to crime in order to survive, and they did drugs to help them deal with the pressure.

Malcolm X, too, would start committing crimes and doing drugs to get from day to day. For example, he says that he sold marijuana, got involved in the illegal gambling scene, and started doing cocaine so that he could steel himself for robbery. Over time, this began to catch up to him—he felt emotionally lifeless, and the drugs were making him sick. After an altercation with another hustler almost ended in violence and led him to go on a multi-drug-fueled bender, Shorty took him back to Boston.

After returning to Boston, Malcolm X decided to start a burglary ring involving Shorty, their friend Rudy, Malcolm X’s girlfriend Sophia, and her sister. Since the women were white, they could get into houses by pretending to have legitimate business there (like selling encyclopedias, for example), which Black men couldn’t do without arousing suspicion. When they left, they could tell the men how the house was set up and where there were any items worth stealing. Their burglary scheme was successful, but Malcolm X explains that he continued doing a lot of drugs to help him deal with his anxiety about being caught.

Eventually, they were caught—and Malcolm X was sentenced to eight to 10 years in prison at the age of 20, despite the average sentence for first-time burglary convictions being only two years. He explains that he believes part of the reason the penalty was so harsh was because he had gotten two white women (who were only sentenced to one to five years in prison) into trouble as well. The prison was dirty with no running water, he felt trapped like an animal, and he was often put in solitary confinement.

Upon reflection in later life, Malcolm X explains his belief that his imprisonment was inevitable—and that it was also inevitable for countless other Black youths. Since they were largely confined to overpoliced ghettos where crime was rampant, denied the opportunity to receive a good education or get good jobs, and able to get their hands on drugs that would numb the pain of their existence easily, Black people were more likely to engage in crime and get caught for it.

The Nation of Islam Gave X a Second Chance

While he was in prison, some of Malcolm X’s family converted to Islam—and they promised that they could help him get out of prison if he joined, too. We’ll discuss the unique teachings of the Islamic organization he joined. Then, we’ll explore how his involvement in this organization changed his life for the better, culminating in the beginning of his civil rights career.

The Nation of Islam’s Unique Teachings

The type of Islam Malcolm X’s family tried to convert him to was known as the Nation of Islam—a collection of teachings promoted by Elijah Muhammad (the Nation of Islam’s leader, who succeeded founder W.D. Fard), which posited that white people are the devil and that they’ve perpetrated evil against Black men by cutting them off from their ancestral cultures and convincing them of white superiority. Malcolm X explains that, according to this belief system, the different races were purposefully created by a scientist named Yacub through eugenic engineering, and the white race was supposed to rule the world for 6,000 years before Black people (who were the original and naturally superior race) would ascend to the top.

How Islam Changed Malcolm X’s Life

Malcolm X explains that he was prepared to accept these teachings as the truth because he knew that the way he had been living was wrong—this seemed a viable alternative. To convert, he first stopped smoking cigarettes and eating pork. He then wrote to Elijah Muhammad, who welcomed him to the religion and told him that he was living proof of white men’s devilish nature—since they deprive Black men like him of opportunities and force them to become criminals to survive. The two began to write to each other frequently, which is how Malcolm X learned more about the religion.

Muhammad’s teachings inspired Malcolm X to learn more about Black history and the histories of other people of color in the world, so he hit the prison library. He explains that Ella had gotten him transferred to a prison with better rehabilitative resources. He concluded that white men had used Christianity to oppress people of color around the globe and that Black people have a rich ancestral heritage to be proud of.

Invigorated by his new beliefs, Malcolm X started participating in the prison debate club, arguing in favor of Black superiority and proselytizing to receptive Black inmates. For the last year of his sentence, he was transferred back to the first prison he was incarcerated at—he explains that this was because the authorities deemed his outspokenness about his newfound pro-Black beliefs dangerous. However, he continued debating—and with time, his self-confidence grew.

Malcolm X notes that he was paroled in 1952, having served six years of his sentence, and began living with his family in Detroit. He joined the Nation of Islam’s temple there and was inspired by the local Black Muslim community’s high moral standards—standards which he felt kept them out of trouble and poverty, while non-Muslim Black people in America continued to languish. He also changed his last name from Little to X—a common practice in the Nation of Islam that signified the true ancestral surnames that had been stolen from Black people when they were enslaved.

Eventually, Malcolm X traveled to Chicago to meet Elijah Muhammad and, under Muhammad’s guidance, set to work recruiting new members and building the religion. He tripled temple membership in Detroit within a few months and went on to establish new temples in Boston, Philadelphia, Springfield, and Atlanta. Because of Malcolm X’s success, Muhammad named him head minister of Temple Seven in New York City.

At Temple Seven, Malcolm X met Betty, the woman who would become his wife. Although he didn’t want to be married because he felt that women were weak, troublesome, and in need of being controlled, he explains that he was inspired by Betty’s devotion to the religion and came to believe they were a good match.

How Malcolm X Became a Civil Rights Leader

Converting to the Nation of Islam didn’t just change the quality of Malcolm X’s life—it also radically transformed his politics, which led to his involvement in the civil rights movement. We’ll first discuss his political beliefs and then explain how he became an activist.

Malcolm X’s Political Beliefs

Malcolm X was critical of the American civil rights movement and its more moderate leaders—he felt that civil rights victories were negligible and that Black people shouldn’t be content to gain their freedom piece by piece. He also explains that he thought much of the movement, including the March on Washington (a civil rights protest led by Martin Luther King Jr.), was performative—it quieted discord but didn’t result in any meaningful changes, partially because it accepted white people’s money (and therefore influence) and sought white people’s approval. He was in favor of a more radical approach to Black liberation, and he believed that the Nation of Islam should participate in civil rights action in order to prove the efficacy of radicalism.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X as Told to Alex Haley (Overview)