HUEY

Rambling take on the life and thoughts of Black Panther Party co-founder Huey P. Newton, by his former “Chief of Staff.”

Endorsed by Newton’s widow as the “first-ever authoritative biography,” this latest of many published works on the BPP, including Newton’s own, fails to impress. Assisted by the Zimmermans, who did better as coauthors with Sex Pistol Johnny Rotten and Hell’s Angel Sonny Barger, Hilliard recalls the early days of the BPP. It’s hard to find much new ground being broken here: He emphasizes the impact made by the Panthers, who accused the Oakland Police Force of systematically harassing and murdering African-Americans, and says that their resultant notoriety eventually came to be seen as an impediment by Newton, who had plenty of time to think during a prison stretch after a manslaughter conviction for the killing of a police officer and during a three-year exile in Cuba, to which he fled following charges of assault and the murder of a prostitute. Breaking with race-war agitator Eldridge Cleaver, the Panthers later moved into community support and education programs. While beatifying Newton as a humanitarian thinker in his moments of clarity, the book documents a sordid progression from petty criminality to violence-associated notoriety with an ongoing, family-destroying addiction to drugs and alcohol, complicated by suspected bipolar disorder. Notably missing from the mix are any comments from BPP co-founder Bobby Seale, who has his own website flogging rhetoric and barbecue recipes.

Vague, conflicted and almost quaint in its socialist pseudo-seriousness.