DJs 41-55

DJ 41. “I believed that a man should do anything that he was slick enough, or bad and bold enough, to do and that a woman was nothing but another commodity.”

This shows Malcolm when he is at one of his lowest times. He hasn’t yet realized what is really important in life. But he will soon find out.

DJ 42. “Looking back, I think I really was at least slightly out of my mind.”

This represents how Malcolm grew as a person and was able to learn from his mistakes and learn to live with them.

DJ 43. “Deep down I actually believed that after living as fully as humanly as possible, one should than die violently.”

This is ironic because later, he believes in nonviolence unless in self-defense. So when he was still at rock bottom, he thought that everyone should have to experience violence.

DJ 44. “She has since told me that she had a foreboding that I was on my way in to big trouble.”

This is foreshadowing Malcolm being arrested. It can also connect back to how it runs in the family that they have geed hunches when something bad was going to happen.

DJ 45. “And I knew, before he did, that he was going to get down and look under the bed.”

This is a connection to the beginning of the book when he says that nothing catches off guard and can sense thing before they happen.

DJ 46. “I was going to have a long time in prison to think about that.”

This statement hints at the fact that prison is going to be a life changing experience for Malcolm. Not only is he going to think about the bad things he has done in his life but sort of realize what things are really important in life.

DJ 47. “I have thought a thousand times, I guess, about how I so narrowly escaped death twice that day.”

This is where Malcolm realizes he has another purpose in life than stealing and getting high all the time.

DJ 48. “Later, when I learned the full truth about the white man, I reflected many time that they average burglary sentence for a first offender, as we all were, was about two years. But we weren’t going to get the average—not for our crime.”

This connects to racism and that black people got harsher punishment than whites, even if that have committed the same crime.

DJ 49. “He told me that all whites knew they were devils…”

The idea that white people are the devil is one example of the idea and beliefs that black people had back when we all weren’t equal. It was a way to cope with the idea that at that time, white people had more power than blacks.

DJ 50. Satan

This chapter is titled Satan because in this chapter Reginald tell Malcolm of his connection between white people and the devil.

DJ 51. “I was going through the hardest thing, also the greatest thing, for any human being to do; to accept that which is already within you, and around you.”

I think this is the biggest life lesson that Malcolm learns and is what he talks to people about. You can connect this quote to “Notes of a Native Son” because they both get at the idea of acceptance of not only who you are, but the situations you are in.

DJ 52. “And so my mind refused to accept anything so grotesque as adultery mentioned in the same breath with Mr. Muhammad’s name.”

The fact that Malcolm is so appalled by this deed done my Mr. Muhammad but shows how much he has changed and how drastically he turned his life around.

DJ 53. “I had to force myself to bend my knees. And waves of shame and embarrassment would force me back up.”

This is a metaphor for Malcolm accepting his past for what it is and learning from it. He had to admit with what he has done and grow from it.

DJ 54. “But the threat of death was much closer to me than somewhere in Louisiana.”

This is foreshadowing his assassination.

DJ 55. “And the reason for this was that my faith had been shaken in a way that I can never fully describe.”

 This statement is further foreshadowing what he said at the beginning of the book, where only one thing has caught him off guard. The betrayal of Mr. Muhammad.