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Overview
The Awakening of Malcolm X is a powerful narrative account of the activist's adolescent years in jail, written by his daughter Ilyasah Shabazz along with 2019 Coretta Scott King-John Steptoe award-winning author, Tiffany D. Jackson.
No one can be at peace until he has his freedom. In Charlestown Prison, Malcolm Little struggles with the weight of his past. Plagued by nightmares, Malcolm drifts through days, unsure of his future. Slowly, he befriends other prisoners and writes to his family. He reads all the books in the prison library, joins the debate team and the Nation of Islam. Malcolm grapples with race, politics, religion, and justice in the 1940s. And as his time in jail comes to an end, he begins to awaken -- emerging from prison more than just Malcolm Little: Now, he is Malcolm X. Here is an intimate look at Malcolm X's young adult years. While this book chronologically follows X: A Novel, it can be read as a stand-alone historical novel that invites larger discussions on black power, prison reform, and civil rights.Details
- ISBN-13: 9780374313296
- ISBN-10: 0374313296
- Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Byr)
- Publish Date: January 2021
- Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 1.3 inches
- Shipping Weight: 0.9 pounds
- Page Count: 336
- Reading Level: Ages 12-18
BookPage® Reviews
The Awakening of Malcolm X
Ilyasah Shabazz, Malcolm X’s daughter, teams up with acclaimed YA author Tiffany D. Jackson to tell the story of the time that the American icon spent in prison for charges related to a series of burglaries. The Awakening of Malcolm X opens in a courtroom in 1946, where Malcolm and his friend Shorty are betrayed by Malcolm’s white girlfriend and sentenced to separate prisons. So begins a nightmare from which Malcolm cannot awaken.
Amid the inhumane conditions and cruel treatment at the Charlestown State Prison, it isn’t long before Malcolm realizes how far he has strayed from the ideals his family raised him to hold. His family never abandons him, however, and as they visit him in dreams, through letters and in the flesh, they help him pick up the pieces of his life and lay the foundation for his future as a leader.
When Malcolm is transferred to a facility that provides opportunities for rehabilitation, he joins its successful debate team and the Nation of Islam. When he is finally released, though his mind is still full of questions, he is armed with the confidence and self-awareness he will need to make a difference for his people.
Shabazz and Jackson’s retelling of the experiences that transformed Malcolm at one of the lowest points in his life makes for a powerful read. As he dwells on his upbringing, readers will see significant connections between the foundation Malcolm’s parents laid for him in the Garveyism movement, which advocated for racial separation, Black economic independence and Pan-Africanism, and the self-love Malcolm eventually finds in the Nation of Islam, which is presented as a sort of homecoming.
Shabazz and Jackson don’t sugarcoat the ugly side of American society in this moment in history, and mesmerizing scenes in which the personal meets the political infuse the story with the fire and passion for which Malcolm X is so well known. The Awakening of Malcolm X is a welcome invitation to consider the light that Malcolm X shone on society’s injustices and what it continues to reveal today.
