A formerly "homeless and semi-literate" man from Toxteth is about to complete ground-breaking research at Cambridge University thanks to a life-changing encounter nearly 40 years ago.
Growing up in local authority care and spending a total of 18 months at secondary school, Malik Al Nasir was too full of "self-loathing" to "think about the future", let alone one in which he has book deals and degrees from all three of Liverpool's universities. The poet said: "I was taught that I was no one, that I was worth nothing, that I didn't belong anywhere."
Malik needed a lifeline, feeling like "the only thing that beckoned for me was the streets". But meeting Gil Scott-Heron, the American musician, poet and civil rights activist, known for his rap, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, after a performance at Royal Court Theatre, "transformed" his life.
