The Birth of "Roots"
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| Thu, 08-11-2005 - 7:33am |
Alexander Murray Palmer Haley, the oldest of three sons (George and Julius), was born to Simon and Bertha (Palmer) Haley on August 11, 1921, in Ithaca, New York.
After twenty years of military service, Haley retired in 1959. Upon his retirement, he embarked upon a new career as a writer. He became an assignment writer for Reader's Digest magazine and later was associated with Playboy magazine, where he inaugurated the "Playboy Interviews" feature. Soon he was recognized for his insightful and in-depth interviews. His interviews of Malcolm X lead to his first book, The Autobiography of Malcolm X: As Told to Alex Haley (1965). Translated into eight languages, this literary work accorded Haley fame as an author.
The stories Haley heard as a youth in the 1920s and 1930s inspired him in 1964 to investigate his maternal ancestry. "Using the pronunciations of the African words repeated. . .by family members," Haley consulted "linguists at several universities." These linguistic specialists verified the language, as well as the village where the words originated. Haley conducted research in the Library of Congress and in Great Britain, where maritime records were available for slave ships. Traveling to the small village of Juffure, in Gambia, West Africa, he met the griot, who gave an oral account of seven previous generations in Mandinka tribal history, back to sixteen-year-old Kunta Kinte, who was wrested from the forest while searching for wood to make a drum. Haley's fact-finding mission verified the oral history preserved by his maternal ancestors.
For his trip back to the United States, Haley booked passage on a cargo ship to try to obtain first-hand knowledge of what his ancestor experienced during the three-month "Middle passage" to America. For ten nights, he slept on a "rough board between bales of raw rubber in the 'hold' of the ship." He tried to conceptualize what it was like to be shackled and lie in filth and human waste, while closely packed with more than a hundred other human beings.
Twelve years later, Haley's research culminated in the 1976 publication of Roots: Saga of An American Family. He called his literary work "faction," meaning that it was a fusion of fact and fiction. Prior to book publication, portions of Roots were condensed in Reader's Digest in 1974. As a result of the unprecedented popularity of Haley's book, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) produced Roots, a twelve-hour televised miniseries based upon Haley's novel, in 1977. The series set records for the number of viewers and the Sunday night finale achieved the highest rating for a single television production. The Roots miniseries' audience surpassed the Civil War drama, Gone With the Wind, which previously had been the most-watched television broadcast.
Roots in book form sold more than 1.6 million copies in the first six months after publication. The text was translated into thirty-seven languages and was serialized in the New York Post; the dramatic story stimulated interest in the study of Africa and in African American genealogy.
Alex Haley received the 1976 National Book Award for Roots. In 1977, Haley received the Pulitzer Prize, as well as the Spingarn Medal from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored.
I have never read or seen the movie... anyone want to share their oppinions?


Thanks, Maggie.
I saw the movie Roots for the first time in 7th grade as part of my Social Studies class. I was captivated by it. In 9th grade I read the book for the first time. It was the longest book I had ever read, but it was so compelling that I charged on through it. I have since seen the movie 3 or 4 times and reread the book a couple times. It is truely an epic saga of an American family and done very well.
I have also read the Autobiography of Malcolm X and Queen by Haley. Both of those were also quite good.
I also read "Black Like Me" - probably in my late teens to early 20's, so late 60's - early 70's. My high school student body had been about 1/3 black & I had quite a few black friends, so I thought I had some idea of what it was like. After reading this, I realized I barely had a clue. It was a real eye-opener & had quite an impact on me. I'd like to get my DS to read it, although I'm afraid he isn't always open to suggestions like that. I also remember when "Roots" came out. I don't think I read the book until after the TV mini-series though. But I remember how everyone stayed close to home so they didn't miss an episode. Several of us went out to dinner one night and the place just started emptying out as the time drew closer.
Liz
Liz