
King: A Life
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Narrated by:
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Dion Graham
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By:
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Jonathan Eig
About this listen
Winner of the 2024 Audie Award for Best Nonfiction Narrator!
This program is narrated by Dion Graham, narrator of over 300 audiobooks and an AudioFile Golden Voice. Dion has won multiple Earphones and Audie Awards.
"Dion Graham superbly narrates this riveting audiobook, emulating the majestic cadence of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, speeches. He captures the Civil Rights leader's deep, resonant tone; deliberate ministerial intonation; and, during offstage moments, his world-weariness... The result is a monumental biography performed exquisitely by a Golden Voice narrator."—AudioFile Magazine (Earphones Award WInner)
"This gripping biography of a revolutionary leader flies by. Listeners interested in a new perspective of Martin Luther King Jr.’s life will be captivated."—Library Journal
"King is a major achievement. With eloquence, compassion, and grace, Jonathan Eig offers a stirringly contemporary and complex portrait of a fully human—and humane—King . . . A resounding triumph."—Peniel E. Joseph, author of The Sword and the Shield
"Eig has pulled off a kind of miracle. Here is the King we know, think we know and ought to know. Here is the leader, the preacher, the orator, the husband, the father, the martyr, the human being—not with melodramatic halo in place, but in all his heroic, tragic Glory. Hallelujah!"—Ken Burns
Named a most anticipated book of 2023 by The Washington Post, The Millions, and Literary Hub
The first full biography in decades, King mixes revelatory and exhaustive new research with brisk and accessible storytelling to forge the definitive life for our times.
Vividly written and exhaustively researched, Jonathan Eig’s King: A Life is the first major biography in decades of the civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.—and the first to include recently declassified FBI files. In this revelatory new portrait of the preacher and activist who shook the world, the bestselling biographer gives us an intimate view of the courageous and often emotionally troubled human being who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself. He casts fresh light on the King family’s origins as well as MLK’s complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists. King reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death. As he follows MLK from the classroom to the pulpit to the streets of Birmingham, Selma, and Memphis, Eig dramatically re-creates the journey of a man who recast American race relations and became our only modern-day founding father—as well as the nation’s most mourned martyr.
In this landmark biography, Eig gives us an MLK for our times: a deep thinker, a brilliant strategist, and a committed radical who led one of history’s greatest movements, and whose demands for racial and economic justice remain as urgent today as they were in his lifetime.
A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
©2022 Jonathan Eig (P)2022 Macmillan AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
2024 Plutarch Awards Nominee, Nominated
2024 PEN Literary Award - Finalist, Short-listed
2023, Time Magazine Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, NPR Best Book of the Year: Long-listed
2023, BookPage Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Amazon.com Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Barnes and Noble Best New Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Washington Post Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Audible.com Best of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Library Journal Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2024, Pulitzer Prize - Winner: Winner
2023, National Book Awards - Longlist: Long-listed
2023, National Book Critics Circle Award - Nominee: Short-listed
2023, Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, CPL: Chicago Public Library Best of the Best: Long-listed
2023, New Yorker Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Wall Street Journal Best Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, Financial Times Books of the Year: Long-listed
2023, New York Times Book Review Notable Books of the Year: Long-listed
“Definitive . . . Monumental . . . An extraordinary achievement and an essential life of the iconic warrior for social justice.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"[A] sweeping biography. Eig gives a rousing recap of King’s triumphs as a civil rights leader . . . [A] complex, nuanced portrait . . . Eig’s evocative prose ably conveys his bravery, charisma, and spell-binding oratory . . . An enthralling reappraisal that confirms King’s relevance to today’s debates over racial justice."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Eig’s monumental work, the first major biography of Martin Luther King Jr. in decades, challenges the image of him as a peaceful advocate of incremental change. There’s plenty of new detail, including from recently declassified F.B.I. files, allowing King to emerge as a complex, humane figure."—J. Howard Rosier, The New York Times
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Overall
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An epic biography of Malcolm X finally emerges, drawing on hundreds of hours of the author's interviews, rewriting much of the known narrative.
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Much more depth than the Haley book.
- By CapitalHeel on 11-03-20
By: Les Payne, and others
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Get Capone
- The Secret Plot That Captured America's Most Wanted Gangster
- By: Jonathan Eig
- Narrated by: Dick Hill
- Length: 17 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Acclaimed journalist and bestselling author Jonathan Eig blows the lid off the Al Capone story. Based on never-before-seen government documents and newly discovered letters written by Al Capone himself, Get Capone presents America's greatest gangster as you’ve never seen him before.
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Get this book
- By Jonathan on 05-13-10
By: Jonathan Eig
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The Autobiography of Malcolm X
- As Told to Alex Haley
- By: Malcolm X, Alex Haley
- Narrated by: Laurence Fishburne
- Length: 16 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.
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it's Nearly perfect
- By Kerry on 09-16-20
By: Malcolm X, and others
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Luckiest Man
- The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig
- By: Jonathan Eig
- Narrated by: Dion Graham
- Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Lou Gehrig was a baseball legend—the Iron Horse, the stoic New York Yankee who was the greatest first baseman in history, a man whose consecutive-games streak was ended by a horrible disease that now bears his name. But as this definitive new biography makes clear, Gehrig’s life was more complicated—and, perhaps, even more heroic—than anyone really knew.
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Excellent biography of a Baseball Legend
- By MikeEC on 03-29-25
By: Jonathan Eig
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Malcolm X
- A Life of Reinvention
- By: Manning Marable
- Narrated by: G. Valmont Thomas
- Length: 22 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Of the great figure in 20th-century American history perhaps none is more complex and controversial than Malcolm X. Constantly rewriting his own story, he became a criminal, a minister, a leader, and an icon, all before being felled by assassins' bullets at age 39. Through his tireless work and countless speeches he empowered hundreds of thousands of black Americans to create better lives and stronger communities while establishing the template for the self-actualized, independent African American man.
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invites further reading on Malcolm X
- By connie on 05-14-11
By: Manning Marable
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The Birth of the Pill
- How Four Crusaders Reinvented Sex and Launched a Revolution
- By: Jonathan Eig
- Narrated by: Gayle Hendrix
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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We know it simply as "the pill", yet its genesis was anything but simple. Jonathan Eig's masterful narrative revolves around four principal characters: the fiery feminist Margaret Sanger, who was a champion of birth control in her campaign for the rights of women but neglected her own children in pursuit of free love; the beautiful Katharine McCormick, who owed her fortune to her wealthy husband, the son of the founder of International Harvester and a schizophrenic.
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Overall Excellent Read
- By Rachel on 04-02-22
By: Jonathan Eig
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Barracoon
- The Story of the Last ""Black Cargo""
- By: Zora Neale Hurston
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 3 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1927, Zora Neale Hurston went to Plateau, Alabama, just outside Mobile, to interview 86-year-old Cudjo Lewis. Of the millions of men, women, and children transported from Africa to America as slaves, Cudjo was then the only person alive to tell the story of this integral part of the nation's history. Hurston was there to record Cudjo's firsthand account of the raid that led to his capture and bondage 50 years after the Atlantic slave trade was outlawed in the United States. In 1931, Hurston returned to Plateau, the African-centric community three miles from Mobile.
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skip the introduction!
- By Earin on 10-16-18
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At Canaan's Edge
- America in the King Years 1965-68
- By: Taylor Branch
- Narrated by: Leon Nixon, Janina Edwards
- Length: 34 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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The final volume of Taylor Branch's monumental, much honored, and definitive history of the Civil Rights Movement (America in the King Years), At Canaan's Edge covers the final years of King's struggle to hold his non-violent movement together in the face of factionalism within the Movement, hostility and harassment of the Johnson Administration, the country torn apart by Vietnam, and his own attempt (and failure) to take the Freedom Movement north.
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Great King bio and an engaging take on an era
- By R.S. on 05-29-23
By: Taylor Branch
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G-Man (Pulitzer Prize Winner)
- J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century
- By: Beverly Gage
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 36 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A major new biography of J Edgar Hoover that draws from never-before-seen sources to create a groundbreaking portrait of a colossus who dominated half a century of American history and planted the seeds for much of today's conservative political landscape.
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Amazing!
- By Jessica Armas on 12-06-22
By: Beverly Gage
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Parting the Waters
- America in the King Years 1954-63
- By: Taylor Branch
- Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi, Janina Edwards
- Length: 45 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Hailed as the most masterful story ever told of the American civil rights movement, Parting the Waters is destined to endure for generations. Moving from the fiery political baptism of Martin Luther King, Jr., to the corridors of Camelot where the Kennedy brothers weighed demands for justice against the deceptions of J. Edgar Hoover, here is a vivid tapestry of America, torn and finally transformed by a revolutionary struggle unequaled since the Civil War.
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Excellent
- By Judith Princz on 05-15-19
By: Taylor Branch
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No Right to an Honest Living
- The Struggles of Boston’s Black Workers in the Civil War Era
- By: Jacqueline Jones
- Narrated by: Leon Nixon
- Length: 17 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Impassioned antislavery rhetoric made antebellum Boston famous as the nation’s hub of radical abolitionism. In fact, the city was far from a beacon of equality. In No Right to an Honest Living, historian Jacqueline Jones reveals how Boston was the United States writ small—a place where the soaring rhetoric of egalitarianism was easy, but justice in the workplace was elusive. Highlighting the everyday struggles of ordinary Black workers, this book shows how injustice in the workplace prevented Boston—and the United States—from securing true equality for all.
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Too much repititive detail, to the point that I ended up disliking the book would not recommend to my friends.
- By Beth Ann on 11-13-24
By: Jacqueline Jones
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John Lewis
- A Life
- By: David Greenberg
- Narrated by: David Sadzin
- Length: 24 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Born into poverty in rural Alabama, Civil Rights icon John Lewis would become second only to Martin Luther King, Jr. in his contributions to the Civil Rights Movement. He was a Freedom Rider who helped to integrate bus stations in the South, a leader of the Nashville sit-in movement, the youngest speaker at the 1963 March on Washington, and the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which he made into one of the major civil rights organizations.
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Really Great!
- By eliz on 04-26-25
By: David Greenberg
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Martin Luther King: The Essential Box Set
- The Landmark Speeches and Sermons of Martin Luther King, Jr.
- By: Clayborne Carson, Kris Shepard, Peter Holloran, and others
- Narrated by: Keith David, Jay Gregory, Martin Luther King, and others
- Length: 15 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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This definitive box set includes all the landmark speeches of the great orator and American leader Martin Luther King, Jr., from his inspirational "I Have a Dream" to his firey "Give Us the Ballot." Comprised of recordings previously included in A Call to Conscience and A Knock at Midnight, The Essential Box Set is a must-have for any home, library, or school collection.
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From his own mouth
- By Tony E. on 09-07-16
By: Clayborne Carson, and others
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An Empire of Wealth
- The Epic History of American Economic Power
- By: John Steele Gordon
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 14 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Throughout time, from ancient Rome to modern Britain, the great empires built and maintained their domination through force of arms and political power. But not the United States. America has dominated the world in a new, peaceful, and pervasive way - through the continued creation of staggering wealth. In this authoritative, engrossing history, John Steele Gordon captures as never before the true source of our nation's global influence: wealth and the capacity to create more of it.
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KNOW YOUR HISTORY!
- By CP Guy on 12-22-20
What listeners say about King: A Life
Highly rated for:
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- Julius Rex
- 06-05-23
Essential Reading
This long overdue book on the iconic MLK draws on extensive interviews with people who knows him, his own works, and thousands of hours of FBI material. King is presented as the legend his is, but not in a hagiographic style; warts and all. Well worth a read.
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- Brandi Goldston
- 10-23-23
READ THIS BOOK!
The writing is outstanding. The narrator is superb. The story will blow you away. I can't say enough great things about this book. Wow!
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- Dr. Brenda Fairfax
- 12-27-23
FBI’s invasion of this man’s privacy!
Thoroughly enjoyed this book. Students should be taught about this great man starting in elementary school throughout college. His wife was brilliant and needs to be incorporated in the teachings also.
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- Robin Gordon
- 12-21-23
In-depth knowledge of MLK
It was very thorough but also engaging. For any historian this is a must read book. The bonus at the end with the author was very cool
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- Denise Kirkman
- 02-08-24
A rounded out humane presentation of a great man
This Book take the time to Present a complete portrait of the man that we know is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And also presents the problem he was trying to solve by displaying its complexities especially in light of where we are as a country today and challenges us to ask what next? What can those of us who care about the dream do to pick up the baton?
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- Greg Williams
- 01-23-24
He was normal man with fears, doubts and flaws.
Nothing. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and was sad when it was finished. And Mr. Eig should know that it did bring a tear.
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- Anonymous User
- 03-11-24
This book is sooooo good!
This book took me on a journey of a man and the struggles that we all face in day to day life. It humanize him. I loved this book
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- Lourdes Marzan
- 02-14-24
Great in-depth biography of an icon
The narrative is smooth and enjoyable “reading”. I saw how the author wanted to humanize MLK, showing his personal qualities and all the nuances and evolution of his beliefs and aims in his life. And he accomplished this by telling the life story of a great man.
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- Laura
- 07-07-24
Depth of Information
This book is very well written and read. I have such a deep appreciation for the information, for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. himself and for the Civil Rights Movement after finishing the book. Highly recommend!
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- Amazon Customer
- 09-11-24
Fluidité de l’écriture et de la lecture
Meeting the man King is fantastic. Inspiring.
Such well researched and written book.
The reading is so endearing.
Thank you.
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