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  |   .--.     .--.     .--.     .--.     .--.     .--.      |
  |  |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |     |
  |  |READ|   |GROW|   |THINK   |RISE|   |FREE|   |LIVE|     |
  |  |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |   |    |     |
  |  '----'   '----'   '----'   '----'   '----'   '----'     |
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  |    "Reading had changed forever the course of my life."   |
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The Library

A meditation on reading, transformation, and liberation

Today's Reading Malcolm's Journey On Reading The Dictionary Transformative Readers Reading as Resistance Reflect About

Malcolm X: A Life Transformed by Books

Malcolm Little was born May 19, 1925, in Omaha, Nebraska. His father, a Baptist preacher and follower of Marcus Garvey, was killed when Malcolm was six. His mother was committed to a mental institution when he was thirteen. He drifted into crime and was imprisoned at twenty.

It was in prison that everything changed. Malcolm began copying the dictionary, word by word, page by page. He read voraciously - history, philosophy, science, religion. When he emerged, he was no longer Malcolm Little but Malcolm X, one of the most powerful voices of the twentieth century.

Timeline of Transformation

1925 - May 19
Born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska
1931 - Father Earl Little dies under suspicious circumstances
Age 6
1938 - Mother Louise committed to mental hospital, children separated
Age 13
1940 - Drops out of school after teacher discourages his dream of becoming a lawyer
Age 15
1946 - Convicted of burglary, sentenced to 8-10 years
Age 20
1948 - Begins self-education in prison, copies entire dictionary
Age 22
1952 - Released from prison, joins Nation of Islam, becomes Malcolm X
Age 27
1954 - Becomes minister of Temple No. 7 in Harlem
Age 29
1958 - Marries Betty Sanders (Betty Shabazz)
Age 32
1963 - 'Message to the Grass Roots' speech in Detroit
Age 38
1964 - Leaves Nation of Islam, makes pilgrimage to Mecca
Age 38
1964 - Founds Organization of Afro-American Unity
Age 39
1965 - February 21: Assassinated at Audubon Ballroom, New York
Age 39

The Books He Read

Malcolm devoured Will Durant's Story of Civilization, studying history from ancient Egypt to modern times. He read Du Bois and Woodson, who revealed the history that had been hidden from him. He studied genetics and anthropology, linguistics and philosophy.

The Autobiography of
Souls of Black Folk
The Story of Civiliz
Wonders of the World
Genetics and the Rac
The Crisis
Message to the Black
Narrative of the Lif
The Philosophy and O
The Mis-Education of
Black Reconstruction
From Slavery to Free
The Fire Next Time
Notes of a Native So
Invisible Man

As he wrote in his autobiography: "Ten guards and the warden couldn't have torn me out of those books."

"I have often reflected upon the new vistas that reading opened to me. I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of my life. As I see it today, the ability to read awoke inside me some long dormant craving to be mentally alive."
- Malcolm X, The Autobiography of Malcolm X