Manning Marable, author of long-awaited Malcolm X biography, dies at 60

Manning Marable, an influential Columbia University scholar of African American history and culture whose forthcoming Malcolm X biography could revise perceptions of the slain civil rights leader, died April 1, just days before the book described as his life’s work was to be released. He was 60.

His wife, Leith Mullings, said Dr. Marable died from complications of pneumonia at New York-Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan. She said he had suffered for 24 years from sarcoidosis, an inflammatory lung disease, and had a double lung transplant in July.

She said his latest book, “Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention,” will be released Monday.

Two decades in the making, the nearly 600-page biography is described as a reevaluation of Malcolm X’s life, bringing fresh insight to such subjects as his autobiography, which is still assigned in many college courses, and his assassination at the Audubon Ballroom in New York on Feb. 21, 1965.

The book is based on exhaustive research, including thousands of pages of FBI files and records from the CIA and State Department. Dr. Marable also conducted interviews with the slain civil rights leader’s confidants and security team, as well as witnesses to his assassination.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/manning-marable-author-of-long-awaited-malcolm-x-biography-dies-at-60/2011/04/02/AFWlCXXC_story.html

I had the privilege of hearing him speak. Really opened my eyes.