[Cleaver's] volume of "post-prison" writings and speeches (a phrase stamped on the book jacket and used as part of the title on the title page, no doubt to squeeze out every last drop of sensationalism) … is sheer polemics. Even worse, it is mere propaganda. Manifestoes, diatribes, threats, exhortations—the whole bag of propagandist tricks is here. Ostensibly to fill a political need. In actuality, to fulfill a simple economic greed: money. No, I'm not blaming Cleaver, although there is much that he can, and will, be blamed for. He apparently did not have much to do with it, now that he is [living in exile in Algiers]. Those who should be blamed know who they are….

During the past year I have talked with Cleaver, sitting with him one night into the small hours of the morning in the offices of Ramparts magazine. I was a sponsor of the International Committee to Defend Eldridge Cleaver. In my review of Soul on Ice in the May, 1968, issue of The Progressive [see excerpt above], I wrote that "this book is important … this book is extraordinary." I asked America to give the book a hearing because it had freshness and insight and a power of conviction. I believed it then, and I believe it now. Eldridge Cleaver is a soul brother, and I don't like what has been happening to him.

Sadly, it must be said, Post-Prison Writings does no one any service, least of all Cleaver. Many of the writings have appeared elsehwere, mainly in the pages of Ramparts. For the most part they should have remained there, for in this last year of his American life Cleaver was devoting himself exclusively to the political situation. In many respects it was akin to the last year of [comedian and social satirist] Lenny Bruce's life, wherein he addressed himself solely to his legal efforts. A pattern of paranoia emerged that was to hamper Bruce in his work and in his ability to view the world. As the shouting increases, conviction lessens. And when this is applied to writing, the power disappears.

The articles in Cleaver's new book are flabby; some are mere exercises. To pick several at random: "The Decline of the Black Muslims," "My Father and Stokely Carmichael," and "The Land Question and Black Liberation." All heat, no light. All polemical, none convincing. All the power gone. Perhaps only in "Shoot-out in Oakland" are there traces of the writer using words to convey real feeling rationally arrived at. As for the speeches, well, speeches are always best being spoken. And Cleaver is a good speaker, very good indeed. Perhaps, as is recognized now with James Baldwin—that he is a fine essayist and not a novelist—Cleaver will be seen to be a better speaker than writer. (p. 28)

So much for the book. I cannot find words strong enough to condemn the cheapness of this sordid affair. If Cleaver were just another self-styled revolutionist out for a little personal power, I would say nothing. Let them publish anything for a fast buck, and be damned. But Cleaver is more than that. Unfortunately, because of the notoriety, the book will have wide circulation. His reputation as a writer deserves better than that.

What went wrong? Where did Cleaver fail, and where did America fail him—even beyond the fact that it bore him into a racist society as a second-class citizen and made him never forget it? Toward the end of my review of Soul on Ice in The Progressive I asked the question: "Where does Cleaver go from here?" And I answered it by suggesting that what happens to him as a writer depends on what happens to him as a man: "The urge to be a full-time revolutionary in a country so desperately ill is overwhelming. Yet the writer must always retain a certain part of himself on the periphery of events if he is to be most effective."

Unfortunately, tragically, Cleaver became that full-time revolutionary; at least in his own mind. He devoted all his energies to his cause and thereby lost the very existence without which a writer can not function. He became a purveyor of propaganda, a writer of tracts, a maker of speeches. All his thoughts were channeled to one end, and the true writer that perhaps existed within slowly smothered and died. There is a world of difference between a propagandist and a writer of conviction. A world as wide as the difference between Soul on Ice and the present collection.

But even beyond that, Cleaver failed himself because of his total commitment to the Black Panthers. At the outset, the Black Panther Party had some semblance of revolutionary zeal in that it subscribed to the traditional revolutionary doctrine of alliances among all oppressed groups. The Black Panthers saw, or pretended to see, their role as leaders in a class struggle. (pp. 28-9)

Now, however, with each passing day the Black Panthers are veering more and more toward a racist-based ideology of a black liberation struggle. Whites will still be "used," but only in subordinate roles. And then, only when needed. Racism is in the saddle, regardless of the honeyed words being spoken. Cleaver, for all his spoken and written protestations as a people-lover, cannot be excused from sharing in this guilt.

Further, Cleaver has allowed himself to become a focal point of a "cult of personality" syndrome, which is death to any revolutionary attitude. He, among the Black Panther leadership, is not alone in this, yet he has done nothing to negate this tendency. His—and the Black Panthers'—adoration of Che Guevara labels the present attitude for what it is: sheer romanticism….

The Black Panthers have scuttled their claim to any revolutionary fervor that could amount to anything, and they are being co-opted and nullified into just another hostile group that will be handled militarily. For this, Cleaver is as guilty as anyone else.

Finally, where did White America fail Cleaver? I mean beyond the harassment, the injustices, the debilitating hatred from known enemies. I am talking about the white liberals who bought and paid for Eldridge Cleaver—C.O.D. Almost from the time he left prison they looked upon him as Jesus Christ returned. They gave him the heady wine of instant fame: He was good copy. They gave him golden robes of green paper: He then shared in their guilt at amassing their wealth. And they crucified him on the altar of politics: resurrecting him as long as he wrote what they wanted to read. They put him up for President in the cruelest joke since the Hunchback, of Notre Dame was jeered as king.

From a writer who wrote what he wanted to say to a publicist who wrote what they wanted to hear. All in one easy stage. Harry Golden had it right: It could happen only in America.

There are 200 million stories in this sick country. This has been one of the sickest of them. (p. 29)