A biography, then, promises to grant what so many historians and activists have longed for: a measure of intimacy with the man, a parsing of the myth to locate Moses on some relative human scale. Yet as he evades scrutiny, our curiosity or fascination increases, and by now Moses is nearly as mythical a figure as Martin Luther King, Jr. The problem with becoming an object of study or veneration is that others will defer to him and miss their own potential. For Moses, the best organizers are invisible rather than imposing their own views or personalities, they strive to encourage the emergence of new leaders. Introspective and learned - before joining the movement he studied philosophy at Harvard - Moses is also elusive, generally unwilling to share the particulars of his life. But a biography of Moses may be the most tantalizing of any. Many books have been published on the movement in recent years, as America observed the 50th anniversary of events like the March on Washington. Moses, left, speaks to two men during a voter registration project in Greenwood, Miss., in April 1963. American educator and civil rights activist Robert P.
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