In his latest project, Ibram X. Kendi is on a mission to help the next generation know and understand the work of Malcolm X.
Kendi already is known as a modern-day interpreter of the present moment through a historical lens, writing and researching for what he hopes the everyday person will understand. Now, he’s written “the official biography of Malcolm X for young readers.”
That book, Malcolm Lives!, was published in May.
“I think working on this book during this time was quite fascinating in the sense that Malcolm X faced similar attacks to what we’re up against today,” he said in an interview.
Kendi knows something of what it’s like to be attacked for your ideas and writing. For his previous work, including How to Be an Antiracist, he has been targeted by the Right and his books have been banned from some public school libraries and attacked by Sen. Ted Cruz during Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing.
“During the last few years of Malcom’s life, he spent quite a bit of time speaking about Black people and to Black people, and obviously challenging racism,” Kendi said. “Malcolm was described almost totally as anti-white.”
In describing the challenges Malcolm had to walk through, Kendi wants to paint a factual picture of what he hopes his young reading audience should know.
“The challenge of clarifying the complicated and complex concepts or situations in ways that are age appropriate in the ways that young people can understand, I see that as part of the writing process. It’s easier to write using terms and words that pack a bunch of meaning. It’s a little bit harder to be very direct and clear, while also being able to express complicated situations.
“I didn’t want to simplify Malcolm X for young readers or want to erase the complexity of the racism he was facing. In order to continue to do that I had to clarify and use terms and analogies and situations that I think young people could better understand.”
Kendi spent two years researching the life of Malcolm X, along with thinking through what should be said in the book on his life.
“It took two years and really the first part of that process was researching and putting together an outline,” he explained. “The challenge with this book is I knew from the beginning I wanted it to be set in scenes from Malcolm’s life, which would really allow me through the actual scenes to give readers more of a 3-D view of what Malcolm was thinking and feeling and experiencing and facing.”
There are a number of scenes depicted in the book that some readers may or may not know.
“Obviously, the scene of when he was assassinated,” Kendi said. And the scene in 1957, when he responds as one of the members of his mosque is brutalized by the police “and he goes to the police station and he brings the fruit of Islam, and the police officer says, ‘One man should not have this much power that allowed him to become very well known in Harlem.’ It was a pivotal moment in his life.
“There were certain pivotal moments I knew, but then I also started to think about what were some moments in his life people don’t know about.”
“There were certain pivotal moments I knew, but then I also started to think about what were some moments in his life people don’t know about. There’s been a lot written about Malcolm X that could shed a different light on him. For instance, one of the scenes in the book is when Malcolm is a young person before he goes to prison, which transforms his life as a young man.”
The New York Times bestselling author has a process to his research and writing style: “I prefer complete silence. I have a home office that’s almost soundproof, and it allows me to be in my own head space. Even before I write, I spend the bulk of the time researching and even organizing my thoughts, through pretty significant outlines so that when I actually sit down to write, I can just focus on the words themselves as opposed to the ideas or even the research. I think that allows, at least for me, my writing to be better because I’m not both trying to figure out what word to use and what idea I want to express.”
Kendi grew up in a pastor’s home; both his mom and dad were pastors and worked with Civil Rights leader Tom Skinner. Kendi credits some of his zeal for justice to his parents.
“Being raised particularly in the church by two ministers who recognized the power of Christianity to liberate Black people, it inspires me in a secular sense to recognize sort of the power in history to liberate people. I recognize the way faith also operates for me is even thinking about myself in communion with others, with so many Black people whose faith has been critical to giving them courage and bravery in critical moments of history.
“You had so many Black faith communities that were fearless, they very much put on the armor of Christ. It certainly gives me that fearlessness.”
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