The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X

Les Payne · Tamara Payne

Oct 2020 · Liveright Publishing

About this ebook

An epic, award-winning biography of Malcolm X that draws on hundreds of hours of personal interviews and rewrites much of the known narrative. Les Payne, the renowned Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative journalist, embarked in 1990 on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to create an unprecedented portrait of Malcolm X, one that would separate fact from fiction. The result is this historic, National Book Award–winning biography, which interweaves previously unknown details of Malcolm X’s life—from harrowing Depression-era vignettes to a moment-by-moment retelling of the 1965 assassination—into an extraordinary account that contextualizes Malcolm X’s life against the wider currents of American history. Bookended by essays from Tamara Payne, Payne’s daughter and primary researcher, who heroically completed the biography after her father’s death in 2018, The Dead Are Arising affirms the centrality of Malcolm X to the African American freedom struggle.

Ratings and reviews

this book is well researched and fills in a lot about Malcolm's life that was unknown to the general public. a concise read about a complicated man! His growth and understanding of national and world events are simply amazing!

Amazing! A must read. This is the best researched and most accurate account of both Malcolm's life and the historical context surrounding his life journey.

Very insightful. Must read Alex Haley's book first. Michael

About the author

Les Payne (1941–2018) was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and was a Pulitzer Prize–winning American journalist. He served as an editor and columnist at Newsday and was a founder of the National Association of Black Journalists.

Tamara Payne acted as Les Payne’s principal researcher. She lives in New York.