Manning Marable Quotes

I once did a - the first piece on Malcolm X that anyone had ever seen in the - white press.

This book, "Speaking Freely," starts when I came to New York. And the first chapter is about a man who became a friend of mine, much to our mutual surprise, Malcolm X.

In November 1963, [Malcolm X] gives his famous message to the grassroots address in Detroit, which really kind of marks off the real turning point in his own development.

Malcolm X was a man among men.

When Malcolm X was assassinated I was working at the Apollo. They brought his body to the Unity Funeral Home, which was around the corner.

Malcolm X was the national spokesperson of the N.O.I., and he wasn't represented in their own newspaper for over a year.

Malcolm X had a habit of scribbling notes in small pieces of paper that [Alex] Haley would surreptitiously pick up at the end of their discussions.

Malcolm X is a person who has inspired - he has been the muse of several generations of black cultural workers, artists, poets, playwrights.

If you blink, you will miss me, but I am in 'Malcolm X.'

Malcolm X broke with the N.O.I. in March 1964, and in that last 11 chaotic months, he spent most of the time outside of the United States. Nevertheless, he built two organizations in the spring of 1964. First, Muslim Mosque Incorporated, which was a religious organization that was largely based on members of the N.O.I. who left with him. It was spearheaded by James 67X or James Shabazz, who was his chief of staff. Then secondly was the Organization of Afro-American Unity.

Malcolm X got famous mainly by being hard on white people, white devils, blue-eyed blond-headed dogs.

[James] Baldwin was a celebrity. A TV show like Kenneth Clark could put him aside of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. He was, at least, one of the three most important spokesmen of the movement and of the black community.

I think that Malcolm X was the most remarkable historical figure produced by Black America in the 20th century.

Malcolm X never renounced and never stepped away from a strong commitment to black nationalism and black self-determination. That's absolutely clear if you do any analysis of his speeches.

I loved Elijah Muhammad with a love that I can't adequately describe.

'Malcolm X' was impressionable for me as a kid.

Malcolm X was the first political person in this country that I really identified with. If he had lived and not been purged, I probably would have joined the Muslims.

When I began my political career, I identified with Malcolm X.

I believe that it is appropriate for young people in society to revisit Malcolm's journey and his role in history.

I always had a deep affection for Malcolm and felt that he had a great ability to put his finger on the existence and the root of the problem. He was an eloquent spokesman for his point of view and no one can honestly doubt that Malcolm had a great concern for the problems we face as a race.

The Civil Rights Movement also reaffirmed me as a singer. It taught me that singing was not entertainment, it was something else.

Either Malcolm X or Martin [Luther King] could have played the role of a unifier, but it was - Malcolm as long as he remained within the Nation of Islam, talking to the converted, he did not represent a fundamental threat to the American government.

Here - at this final hour, Harlem has come to bid farewell to one of its brightest hopes - extinguished now, and gone from us forever.... Many will ask what Harlem finds to honor in this stormy, controversial and bold young captain - and we will smile. ...We will answer and say unto them, ‘Did you ever talk to Brother Malcolm? Did you ever really listen to him? ...For if you did you would know him. And if you knew him you would know why we must honor him.'

UCLA acknowledged this shift by bringing in Alex Haley (the co-author of The Autobiography of Malcolm X) and Eldridge Cleaver (Soul on Ice) as speakers.

I was from my little perch in a prep school I saw the civil rights movement and it was defining the moral dimensions of the time and I was drawn to it and I read James Baldwin and read Invisible Man and these were my touch points. But it was when I got to Michigan and saw a bigger world, a real world, that I got involved.