The Diary of Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz 1964

Abstract

The Diary of Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz 1964 edited by Herb Boyd and Ilyasah Al-Shabazz with annotations and commentary by Haki R. Madhubuti and afterword by James H. Cone (Chicago: Third World Press, 2013, pp. 216), ISBN: 978-088378-351-1. LCCN: BP233.Z8L57 2013; 320.54'6092-dc23 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Journalist, activist, author, biographer, and New York City College teacher Herb Boyd, activist, organizer, motivational speaker, writer and author Ilyasah Al-Shabazz, the third daughter of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz; and Betty Shabazz (1934-1997), award-winning poet, educator, essayist, editor and founder-publisher of Third World Press (the oldest independent book publisher of Black thought/literature in the U.S.) Haki R. Madhubuti, and Union Theological Seminary distinguished professor of Systematic Theology; Black liberation theology founder and theologian James H. Cone and others (Fred L. Hord of the National Association for Black Culture Centers, James Turner of Cornell University, 1986 Nobel Prize for Literature winner Wole Soyinka, HRH Princess Alia bint Al Hussein of Jordan, Edmund W. Gordon professor emeritus of Yale University and Teachers College at Columbia University, Henry Louis Gates, Jr. of Harvard University and notwithstanding, boxing great Muhammad Ali, a friend, mentor and often confidant to Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz) have endorsed this book. In an attempt to seemingly stay clear of any future controversy, the acknowledgments (p. ix) states that El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (Malcolm X) intended to publish his travel journal as a book which the editors and publisher now consider it to be a great honor for them to complete this bio-documentarial book in an effort to insure that he attains his rightful place in history by publishing an authentic volume that can increase the understanding of Malcolm X and inspire future projects about him. This book also was published with the cooperation and support of Malcolm X and Betty Shabazz's daughters, Attallh, Qubilah, Ilyasha, Gamilh-Lumumba, Malikah and Malaak Shabazz, and the staff of Third World Press, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture of the New York Public Library (the repository of Malcolm X archives and materials), George R. Brokemond of Highland Community Bank (Chicago, IL), Alter and Beverly Lomax, and Wesley Snipes. In general, The Diary of Malcolm X is a more complete view of Malcolm X (El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz) than the now more than 45 editions (in many languages) of the Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley (p. xiii). Therefore, the diary is poised as a more mature and politically astute picture of Malcolm X, in an internationalist context, who was under constant governmental observation because of his call for the internalization of the African American liberation struggle in the U.S. (p. xii, xiii), with an outline of how Malcolm (an ambassador without portfolio) planned to formerly petition the U.N. on behalf of the African American community in the U.S. and formerly document/record U.S. human right violations (enslavement, racial discrimination, etc.) perpetrated against the African American community, with the support of leaders in Africa and the Middle East (ibid.). In an effort to allow readers to experience The Diary as it was written, the editors have included annotations, 36 pages of biographical material (with selected references), and commentary that direct the reader to particular dates in The Diary with the intent to offer no or little interference in the train of thought of Malcolm X as he wrote his diary (p.176), and at the same time, include: Malcolm X mentioning how he visited Kwame Nkrumah . for over an hour at the University of Accra ... (p.194); how in the late fifties there were between 200 to 250 African American expatriates living Ghana; how Abdul Rahman Mohamed Babu (1924-1996) was frequently in touch with Malcolm X during the sixties (p. …