The Future Is the Beginning: The Words and Wisdom of Bob Marley

In this one-of-a-kind collection, edited by Gerald Hausman and with an introduction by Cedella Marley, the words of reggae legend Bob Marley are brought together as a testament to the deeply felt and powerfully motivated sense of spirit of the revered singer-songwriter and performer who helped spread both Jamaican music and the Rastafarian movement across the world.

The texts, many unpublished in book form, were gathered at 56 Hope Road, Kingston, Jamaica, where Bob lived and worked in the 1970s. He would go on to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and he also received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a United Nations Medal of Peace. Marley’s compilation album Legend is one of the bestselling recordings of all time, going platinum ten times in the United States and selling twenty million copies worldwide.

Bob Marley’s wisdom came not only through his songs but also from his poetic, spoken words. The short selections in this book, which are compiled from interviews he gave over the years, will give readers a true sense of who Bob Marley really was and are bound to inspire them with his timeless message of faith, unity, and love.

“It’s Bob, as he was, as he is, as he will always be, talking personally to you.”

—Gerald Hausman,

from the editor’s note

“My father spoke plain and simple words, the least tricky of all. These came from Proverbs in the Bible and also the folk sayings of the people of Jamaica. . . . He was wise beyond education, beyond information.”

—Cedella Marley,

from the introduction

Harry Belafonte is not just one of the greatest entertainers of our time; he has led one of the great American lives of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Now, at last, this extraordinary icon tells us about it all--his poverty-ridden childhoodin Harlem and Jamaica; his meteoric rise to become one of the world's most popular singers, breaking down racial barriers that no one had broken before, achieving equal popularity with white and black audiences; his lifelong, passionate involvement at the heart of the civil rights movement and countless other political and social causes. Along the way he's befriended many beloved and important figures in both entertainment and politics--Paul Robeson, Eleanor Roosevelt, Sidney Poitier, John F. Kennedy, Marlon Brando, Martin Luther King, Jr., Robert Kennedy, Nelson Mandela, Fidel Castro--and writes about them with the same exceptional candor and insight with which he reveals himself on every page.

As both an artist and an activist, Belafonte has touched the lives of countless men and women. With My Song, he has found yet another way to entertain and inspire us. It is an electrifying memoir from a remarkable man.

GERALD HAUSMAN is the editor of The Kebra Nagast: The Lost Bible of Rastafarian Wisdom and Faith from Ethiopia and Jamaica and is widely consulted as an expert on Caribbean folklore, Native American studies, and Rastafarian culture. He has been honored by the American Folklore Society, the New York Public Library, the Jamaican Ministry of Education, Bank Street College of Education, and many other organizations.

CEDELLA MARLEY, daughter and first child of Bob and Rita Marley, is the C.E.O. of Tuff Gong International and the mother of three children. She is the author of the children’s books One Love, Every Little Thing, and The Boy from Nine Miles. Cedella is a three-time Grammy Award–winning singer with her brothers, Ziggy and Steve, and her sister, Sharon, in the group the Melody Makers. When not writing and performing, Cedella also helps run the family’s charitable organization, 1Love.

Introduction by Cedella Marley

 

Editor’s Note from Gerald Hausman

 

Bob Talking to You