Signifiers of the apocalypse

Abstract

When I was nine or ten I first met Malcolm. I was part of a subterfuge my sister used to get out of the house so she and some of her girlfriends could check out “this fine preacher at this storefront on Tremont Street.” Then, two or three years later I heard about colored people in Montgomery boycotting the buses, and being led by Martin, that “handsome young preacher,” as my foster mothers and my aunts would say. I locate Martin and Malcolm in a narrative told with images, memory depicted in the play of imagination, reconstructing the remembered events so as to be useful. I came to know Malcolm in the stories he told to illustrate a point—to signify. I came to know Martin through the stories I was hearing in the Negro barbershops about him—his signification.