Before long, Malcolm supports himself by selling marijuana, engaging in burglaries and stickups, and running numbers for local gamblers. This puts him into contact with musicians, drug dealers, pimps, and racketeers. Around two years later, Malcolm relocates to New York where he gets a job as a waiter at the legendary Harlem nightclub Small’s Paradise. Around this time, Malcolm straightens his hair, starts wearing flamboyant zoot suits, and enters into a relationship with a young affluent White woman named Sophia. Not long after his arrival, Malcolm meets Shorty, a musician and poolroom employee who helps him navigate the Black nightlife scene in Boston. He successfully convinces his adult half-sister Ella to take him into her home in the culturally vibrant, predominantly Black neighborhood of Roxbury in Boston, Massachusetts. Suddenly and painfully aware of his second-class status as a young Black person, Malcolm works to escape Mason.
Yet a pivotal moment arrives for Malcolm in eighth grade, when an otherwise supportive English teacher tells Malcolm it is unrealistic for him to pursue a career as a lawyer.
The only Black person in his junior high school class, Malcolm thrives academically and socially. In 1938, Malcolm’s mother Louise suffers a mental breakdown and is sent to the Kalamazoo State Mental Hospital, leaving Malcolm in the care of a White couple in nearby Mason, Michigan. When Malcolm is around six years old, members of the Black Legion, a White supremacist terrorist organization, murder Earl. This makes Earl the target of White supremacists, particularly after the Littles relocate to Lansing, Michigan. This study guide refers to the 2015 reprint edition published by Ballantine Books.īorn Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska in 1925, Malcolm is the son of Earl Little, a Baptist minister who spreads the Pan-African teachings of Marcus Garvey.
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