The violence of the oppressed is only a reflection of that of the oppressor. [...] There are not several faces of the oppressed. King, Baldwin and Malcolm X mark the same and implacable route of revolt, whose spring, once released, rarely does not relax until the end," wrote Albert Memmi in 1965, in the presentation of the first edition of this book, published by Éditions François Maspero. "There is no good violence, ours, and bad violence, that of others," writes the author of Portrait of the Decolonized in the present edition .

Because, more than forty years later, the question of oppression and the violence it provokes is still present, in the Third World as well as in the ghetto cities of the metropolises of the North. Hence the interest in reading (or rereading) today these interviews, broadcast in 1963 by an American television channel, with three of the leading figures of the American black movements of the 1960s: the writer James Baldwin (1924-1987), "torn, intelligent and passionate, who understands everything and forgives much"; the "minister" Malcolm X (born in 1925 and assassinated on February 21, 1965), leader of the black Muslims who "no longer understands and no longer wants to understand anyone"; and the pastor Martin Luther King (born in 1929 and assassinated on April 4, 1968), follower of non-violence and love of the adversary.
An irreplaceable document for understanding the causes of the revolt and thinking about ways to end oppression.