My fondest hope is that 'Roots' may start black, white, brown, red, yellow people digging back for their own roots. Man, that would make me feel 90 feet tall.

The New York Times reported that six million copies of the book had been sold by 1977. Two years later he returned to his father and stepmother to inform them of his withdrawal from college.

He is best known as the author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family and the co-author of The Autobiography of Malcolm X.