THe Metamorphosis of MAlcolm X

THe Metamorphosis of MAlcolm X

Malcolm X once wrote, “My life has always been one of changes” (Haley 404). In his autobiography, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, it is very evident that through his life, he went through a series of drastic changes that went from one extreme to another. He went from being at “the bottom of the American white man’s society,” to become one of the most influential advocates of Black pride (150). Throughout the novel the most evident changes are when Malcolm X moves to Boston, goes to prison, and going on Hajj.

After living in Michigan, Malcolm X moves in with his half-sister, Ella, in Boston. Malcolm X described the move as “pivotal or profound in its repercussions” (38). When he gets to Boston, he sets out to explore the city and to “get the feel of Boston” (40). When he looks around the area he is living in he finds it full of nothing but “Hill Negroes” (40). He notices that all these black people are simply breaking their “backs trying to imitate white people” (40). He immediately rejects their way of thinking and finds himself in the middle of the town’s “ghetto section” (42).

Soon through his friendship with “Shorty”, Malcolm X is exposed to a new kind of living. He spends his first month in Roxbury with his “mouth hanging open” (48). He saw small black children “shooting craps, playing cards, fighting… [throwing] around swear words and slang expressions” (43). Eventually, all this exposure to black people “being their natural selves” took a great toll on him (43). After hanging out with Shorty and his friends, inevitably, he took his first reefers, first cigarettes, and the first liquor he drank. He ultimately went from being “country” to a “cool cat.” When he was exposed to all these “jungle streets,” he became a hustler and soon began to live like an animal, living only to survive (163). As he became more involved with these people he lost all sense of values and morals. He eventually became a common street hustler, drug dealer, and burglar until he was finally caught and served seven years in jail.

Malcolm X’s experience in jail “saved” him eventually and molded him into the great leader he is known for today. While in prison the first thing that made a “positive impression” on his life is a fellow inmate named “Bimbi.” (153). What impressed him the most...

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...letion of the Hajj he accepted the true Islam. The “color-blindness of the Muslim world’s religious society and the color-blindness of the Muslim world’s human society” greatly influenced Malcolm X’s decision to convert to the true Islam, and take back all his beliefs that the white man on the whole was the devil. Rather, the “specific attitudes and actions toward the black man, and toward all other non-white men” that was condescending, was what was wrong with the American society (333). This trip made a great impact on Malcolm X’s beliefs and changed his life.

A year after he returned, Malcolm X was shot repeatedly in the chest while giving a speech in front of two hundred people, including his wife and four children. His life was characterized by a number of extreme changes that transformed his views and what he stood for. When he moved to Boston he found himself at the bottom of the American society, when he went jail he found himself again and gained self-pride, but when he came back form Mecca, as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, his views totally changed, he was on the top of the American society and there he will remain as one of the most influential advocates of Black pride.