Reading Response to Malcolm X- Leslie Martinez

Quote 1:

“I saw that the best thing I could do was to get hold of a dictionary- -to study, to learn some words. I was lucky enough to reason also that I should try to improve my penmanship. It was sad. I couldn’t even write in a straight line. It was both ideas together that moved me to request a dictionary along with some tablets and pencils from the Norfolk Prison Colony school.

I spent two days just riffling uncertainly through the dictionary’s pages. I’d never realized so many words existed! I didn’t know which words I needed to learn. Finally, just to start some kind of action, I began copying.”

Malcolm’s dedication to learning to read became a huge part of his life. Whether he didn’t finish school, he didn’t know much of anything but he still took the time to copy words from the dictionary every day to get a comprehension of words he didn’t know even existed. All he wanted was to actually have a sense of what he was reading. His dedication allowed him to make many discoveries of words he never even knew existed and that excited him. There was a significant amount of joy that came from his studies like reading the words aloud and even writing them.

Quote 2:

“I could spend the rest of my life reading, just satisfying my curiosity—because you can hardly mention anything I’m not curious about. I don’t think anybody every got more out of going to prison than I did. In fact, prison enabled me to study far more intensively than I would have if my life had gone differently and I had attended some college. I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities, and boola- boola and all that. Where else but in prison could I have attacked my ignorance by being able to study intensely sometimes as much as fifteen hours a day.”

Malcolm had this huge accomplishment for himself, that accomplishment was that he was able to way more than he would have if he went through college. He was proud of that accomplishment. His studying in prison was what shifted his view on life. He’d pondered about how it would have been if he has actually gone to college, it would’ve been a complete distraction with the parties, panty-raiding, etc. Books finally started to make sense in his world and that’s all that mattered. He was able to accomplish that on his own.