Presented in partnership with Town Hall Seattle and Elliott Bay Book Company

Tamara Payne joins us via livestream to share from the final biography, The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X.

Drawing on hundreds of hours of interviews—with all living siblings of the Malcolm Little family, classmates, street friends, cellmates, Nation of Islam figures, FBI moles and cops, and political leaders around the world—she traces his life from his Nebraska birth in 1925 to his Harlem assassination in 1965. Payne explores how her father corrects the historical record and delivers extraordinary revelations with a biographer’s unwavering determination. She discusses the intensive research process, and introduces a penetrating and riveting biography that affirms the centrality of Malcolm X to the African American freedom struggle. In a moment of renewed vigor for the struggle in Black freedom, this presentation is essential viewing.

Tamara Payne is Les Payne’s daughter and served as his principal researcher.