The Autobiography of Malcolm X: As Told to Alex Haley

Black History Month

Staff recommendations, guest essays, and curated reading lists.

One of TIME’s Ten Most Important Nonfiction Books of the Twentieth Century.

In the searing pages of this classic autobiography, originally published in 1964, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and anti-integrationist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Black Muslim movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American Dream, and the inherent racism in a society that denies its nonwhite citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time. The Autobiography of Malcolm X stands as the definitive statement of a movement and a man whose work was never completed but whose message is timeless. It is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand America.

“Malcolm X’s autobiography seemed to offer something different. His repeated acts of self-creation spoke to me; the blunt poetry of his words, his unadorned insistence on respect, promised a new and uncompromising order, martial in its discipline, forged through sheer force of will.” Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father

“Extraordinary...a brilliant, painful, important book.” The New York Times

“A great book....Its dead level honesty, its passion, its exalted purpose, will make it stand as a monument to the most painful truth.” The Nation

Alex Haley is the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece Roots. With Malcolm X, he coauthored The Autobiography of Malcom X. He died in February 1992.