[Music]
okay hey how are y’all doing this
morning when people think about the
Giants of hip-hop think about the great
rappers out there a couple different
names come to mind right jay-z Tupac
Shakur may he rest in peace
Kendrick Lamar Biggie’s and Biggie
Smalls but one person is frequently
forgotten and this guy is the original
hip hop gangster artist out there who’s
that person
the notorious ba Rd okay so I’m here to
tell you now some of you may be rolling
your eyes right now oh man we thought
this was going to be cool he opened this
kendrick lamar’s is going to be
something interesting we sat all day for
this but um now they going to talk to me
about this guy who wrote stories 500
years ago in inscrutable Old English
this dude has zero relevance for my life
well you’re wrong okay something people
think Shakespeare wrote for kings and
queens and Dukes and duchesses he did
not he was an entertainer he wrote plays
for popular audience made up largely of
Groundlings who paid exactly one penny
to stand out in the stage drinking cheap
booze like Old English ale eating
chicken maybe getting rained on and
snowed on a trip to the Globe Theater
was like going gov baller Summer Jam
right if the show is good everybody
cheered if the show stunk
you booed maybe you brought some
vegetables along is threw a little
tomatoes you threw a little lettuce up
there cabbage whatever you had I
appreciate you all for not bring
vegetables today by the way so thank you
for that most importantly if you had
poetic aspirations in the 15 and 1600s
and wanted to reach a broad audience you
became a playwright it’s way to do it
today you become a rap
so if Shakespeare was around today he’d
be trying to combine his words his flow
with some mad beats to reach his desired
audience and who his desired audience be
his desire audience would be you guys
right that’s my boy Shakespeare what it
looked like today okay most importantly
if you look at many of the central
themes of contemporary rap music
many of them are precisely the same
themes Shakespeare focused on in its
works okay so let’s take a look at some
of these themes among these themes are
racism political injustice right when I
rap music on there sex and partying and
having fun yeah see that regularly gang
life violence okay again something we
commonly see these are central themes in
hip-hop today these were central themes
in shape William works of William
Shakespeare okay so let’s talk about
racism first all right we see racism
hip-hop all the time right let’s check
in with our man Tupac Shakur on his
legendary song changes
disgraceful racist we are a bunch of
what it takes to make this one better
place let’s see rates the wasted take
the evil of the V whatever yeah karate
is all black and white and smokes crack
tonight and yo it’s our telephone kill
each other the idioms are mere ears on
the heel ease up
similarly in their hit last year we the
people tribe called quest’s talked about
the rise of racist racist problems and
racist hatred in this country
[Music]
or we hate you wait okay so you guys are
sitting there right now thinking all
right that’s great thank you for the
beats this morning we could need we need
a little wake-up call at this point what
does this have to do with Shakespeare
okay Shakespeare lived in England you
don’t get more Anglo than that he knew
nothing about America’s problems of race
500 years ago okay 500 years later after
the time that he wrote so what does this
guy know okay but this is the genius of
Shakespeare okay this is the brilliance
of Shakespeare Shakespeare wrote a play
called a fellow and the fellow is a
story about a great black general trying
to make his way in White Venice okay
Estella was sort of the Cam Newton of
the Venice war scene in a world full of
white coaches and white quarterbacks all
right and but a solo had a bigger even
most a bigger problem there
he wasn’t just black he wasn’t more you
know what it means to be a more that
means you’re a Muslim so this man is a
Black Muslim living in Venice located in
Italy home of the Pope for those of you
who took AP euro this year okay so what
is she what does a fellow do when he
gets to Venice a fellow finds a
beautiful white girl and he secretly
marries her and how does her father
react to this
our Father accuses a fellow of employing
um employing witchcraft to take his
daughter his father says whether a maid
so tender fair and happy so opposite to
marriage that she shunned the wealthy
curled darlings of our nation would ever
have to incur a general mock run from
her garden to the sooty bosom of such a
thing as thou to fear not to delight
judge me the world it is not gross and
since thou has practiced on her with
foul charms abused her delicate youth
with drugs and minerals so Desdemona’s
father what’s she saying she say there
is no way my pristine daughter would
hang out with you much less marry you a
fellow the Black Muslim general in
Venice
you must have draw
hugged her that’s the only way to do it
later on in a cell oh we meet the chief
antagonist Shakespeare’s teeth chief
sellers chief tormentor guy named jogo
okay and what does Yoko say about a cell
oh okay Yago explains again and again as
I have told thee I’ve told the often and
retell the again and again I hate the
more my cause is hearted Yahoo never
explains why he hates the more but one
could assume why does he hate the more
because he’s different because he’s
black Shakespeare focuses on racism
again in the Merchant of Venice with
Shylock chief antagonist in a play is it
you he sums up racism quite simply he
says I am a Jew hath not a Jew eyes as
not a Jew hands organs dimensions senses
affections and passions if you prick us
do we not bleed if you tickle us do we
not laugh if you poison us do we not die
and if you wrong us shall we not revenge
through these characters Shakespeare
like Tupac and Tribe Called Quest is
saying whether you’re black or white Jew
Christian or Muslim we are all people
we’re all the same underneath and that
was a theme that was relevant 500 years
ago when Shakespeare wrote it and it’s
obviously quite relevant today okay
perhaps you say all right so you know
really clever or you found this common
theme going on there let’s move on to
the next one here sex and partying and
drinking all right we know rap music is
full of these celebratory references
let’s take a visit with my personal
favorite jay-z
[Music]
you even gotta bring your purses out we
did oh yeah traces on okay so rock boys
in the building tonight and all the
drinks are on us guys let’s party let’s
celebrate not an unusual theme in rap
music Snoop Dogg said it more succinctly
than that when Snoop Dogg simply said
rolling down the street smoking in Indo
sippin on gin and juice right it’s as
simple as that that’s all that life is
about right according to our friend
Snoop Dogg here okay so that’s fine what
does this have to do with some English
dude who live 500 years ago what did
Shakespeare or his characters know about
drinking and partying and sex and all
that stuff actually quite a bit
Shakespeare’s works are full of
rabble-rousing carousing and drinking
and scattered among his many characters
are a number of guys that you might
refer to as players currently and I’m
sure they weren’t referred to that way
back in Shakespeare’s time but his works
are full of scandalous and salacious
references would be quite at home in the
works of folks like Ludacris and little
Wayne let’s take a look here at a number
of these references to drinking here
okay so if you take a look there it said
it says simply that we’re talking about
ale in drinks and pull up my notes here
if sack and sugar be a sin God helped
the wicked a quart of ale is a dish for
a king maybe parents of brothers and
sisters have thought that sometime I
would give all my fame for a pot of ale
and so on and so forth so all this
stuff’s out there saying hey Shakespeare
liked to party too
Shakespeare enjoyed his drinks he
enjoyed his ale enjoyed guzzling as well
okay so we have that piece covered what
about
this was Victorian England we don’t talk
about things like that not the way
that’s talked about in rap music well
you’d be surprised actually if you take
a look we’ve got all of these varying
lines from Shakespeare Hamlet says to
his girlfriend Ophelia that’s a fair
thought to lie between maids legs
Yago talking about a cell oh says your
daughter and the moor are making the
beast with two backs you don’t have to
be too creative to figure out what that
means okay and then in a play called
Titus Andronicus we have the first to my
knowledge at least the first yo mama
joke in which an upset son Chiron says
you have undone our mother and Aran was
pictured up there comes back and says
villain I have done thy mother okay so
we see again this common thread that
runs through Shakespeare and runs
through hip-hop let’s focus on our last
theme here gang warfare and violence
okay gang warfare in the thug life rap
music is sometimes criticized sometimes
praised for us focus on the thug life
and gang warfare Kendrick Lamar and good
kid bet mad city talks about life among
the Bloods and the Crips
if Pyro’s and Crips I got alone they
probably got me down by the end of the
song seemed like the whole city go
against me every
ministry okay all right so great and
there’s plenty of others out there
talking about the Bloods and the Crips
and gang warfare what does this have to
do with Shakespeare well quite a bit we
find similar instance of gang warfare in
unusual places such as Romeo and Juliet
Oh Romeo and Juliet that beautiful
romance what could that have to do with
any of this Romeo and Juliet is not
simply the story of poor star-crossed
lovers
Romeo and Juliet is a play about gang
warfare between two clans
the Capulets and the Montagues okay
these Capulets and Montague’s hate each
other and they go out through the course
of this play and I don’t want to be
spoil it for you guys but they go out
and they kill each other so if you take
a look at Baz Luhrmann’s film Romeo and
Juliet makes this really clear and here
you’ve got gianluca’s amo playing t-ball
and he comes up and says what drawn and
talk of peace I hate the word as I hate
hell all Montague’s in thee have at thee
coward and then he pulls his sword or in
the case of Baz Luhrmann’s film his gun
and they go at it okay so it got a
little of gang warfare here that’s cool
what about violence we all know that
hip-hop is filled with violence
sometimes it gets criticized for that as
well as jay-z puts it in his song threat
put that night take a little bit of life
from you
come on frightening yo shall I continue
it’s gone too young let us sing the song
I met it home to you lovely one signal
okay that’s pretty tough right I put the
knife to you I put the gun to you okay
the violence in today’s hip-hop is
nothing compared to Shakespeare in these
plays you encounter the most vicious
psychopathic twisted murders and
miscreants you could ever imagine
okay we have plays we’re an aspiring
prince kills off his brother the king
then he kills over his other brother
quit so he’s ahead of him in line to the
throne then he marries the wife of a guy
he killed earlier and then he kills off
his sister and his tiny little nephews
okay that’s Richard the third for you
another example how about we have a
situation where a prince poisons his
brother the king and then marries the
Kings wife and then tries to murder the
dead king’s son to be or not to be folks
that’s Hamlin third here we have another
one where we’ve got a jealous King who
suspects his baby is not his own so what
does he do he tells a woodsman take the
baby out to the woods and kill the baby
and the woodsman would have succeeded
but for the fact that the woodsman first
is eaten by a bear eat your heart out
for those of you who saw the movie the
revenant it gets pretty rough here too
and then maybe my personal favorite from
the movie Titus you’ve got two young men
who get angry at an aging general so
what do they do they snatch the generals
young daughter take her away they rape
her they cut her hands off and they cut
out her tongue so she can’t tell anybody
who did it all right and these are just
some examples in Macbeth alone there are
32 murders or deaths in Macbeth they
call it the Scottish play because it’s
bad luck to say its name but
something horrible might befall you okay
it doesn’t get more gangster than the
stuff that’s going on in Shakespeare’s
plays okay so we’ve got these common
threads but why am I telling you all
this why am i sharing this with you
really to help you guys understand that
all art and poetry certainly great art
in poetry share a common tradition at
the English language poetic and lyrical
tradition that may have started with
Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales
which was a scandalous work at the time
back in the 1300s continued 200 years
later with the notorious BA Rd
Shakespeare and now is reflected in
today’s hip-hop artists like jay-z
childish gambino and Kendrick Lamar that
the sometimes almost invisible thread
that began to unwind centuries ago
through the work of these contemporary
hip runs through the work of these
contemporary hip hop poets today they
are the voices of conscience they are
the voices of outrage they are the
voices shouting to be heard so for you
hip hop kids out there who think that
Shakespeare has nothing to do with you
give it a try see what wonders it might
hold maybe try to figure out why this
guy has been so popular for so long try
and figure out why everything from West
Side Story to The Lion King owes a debt
to Shakespeare Lion King scar the
jealous uncle kills Mufasa the brother
and then tries to eliminate his son
folks that’s Hamlet no disrespect to our
friends at Disney but they just swiped
that from Shakespeare and for any of you
cultivated parents out there who think
rap is a bunch of noise who think
hip-hop is really just this awful
indictment of music today open your
minds a little bit listen to songs like
we the people from Tribe Called Quest or
Empire State of Mind from jay-z and
Alicia Keys you may kind of come to
understand the brilliant poetry can come
from unexpected places now I’m going to
leave you guys with the words of
lin-manuel Miranda who’s perhaps the
first guy to perfectly marry hip hop and
theater into a seamless whole in his
popular musical you may have heard of it
called Hamilton when you have an
opportunity to experience new art when
you have an opportunity to hear new
music when you have opportunity to see
new or different theater do not throw
away your shot throw away
[Music]
thanks very much
[Applause]
okay hey how are y’all doing this
morning when people think about the
Giants of hip-hop think about the great
rappers out there a couple different
names come to mind right jay-z Tupac
Shakur may he rest in peace
Kendrick Lamar Biggie’s and Biggie
Smalls but one person is frequently
forgotten and this guy is the original
hip hop gangster artist out there who’s
that person
the notorious ba Rd okay so I’m here to
tell you now some of you may be rolling
your eyes right now oh man we thought
this was going to be cool he opened this
kendrick lamar’s is going to be
something interesting we sat all day for
this but um now they going to talk to me
about this guy who wrote stories 500
years ago in inscrutable Old English
this dude has zero relevance for my life
well you’re wrong okay something people
think Shakespeare wrote for kings and
queens and Dukes and duchesses he did
not he was an entertainer he wrote plays
for popular audience made up largely of
Groundlings who paid exactly one penny
to stand out in the stage drinking cheap
booze like Old English ale eating
chicken maybe getting rained on and
snowed on a trip to the Globe Theater
was like going gov baller Summer Jam
right if the show is good everybody
cheered if the show stunk
you booed maybe you brought some
vegetables along is threw a little
tomatoes you threw a little lettuce up
there cabbage whatever you had I
appreciate you all for not bring
vegetables today by the way so thank you
for that most importantly if you had
poetic aspirations in the 15 and 1600s
and wanted to reach a broad audience you
became a playwright it’s way to do it
today you become a rap
so if Shakespeare was around today he’d
be trying to combine his words his flow
with some mad beats to reach his desired
audience and who his desired audience be
his desire audience would be you guys
right that’s my boy Shakespeare what it
looked like today okay most importantly
if you look at many of the central
themes of contemporary rap music
many of them are precisely the same
themes Shakespeare focused on in its
works okay so let’s take a look at some
of these themes among these themes are
racism political injustice right when I
rap music on there sex and partying and
having fun yeah see that regularly gang
life violence okay again something we
commonly see these are central themes in
hip-hop today these were central themes
in shape William works of William
Shakespeare okay so let’s talk about
racism first all right we see racism
hip-hop all the time right let’s check
in with our man Tupac Shakur on his
legendary song changes
disgraceful racist we are a bunch of
what it takes to make this one better
place let’s see rates the wasted take
the evil of the V whatever yeah karate
is all black and white and smokes crack
tonight and yo it’s our telephone kill
each other the idioms are mere ears on
the heel ease up
similarly in their hit last year we the
people tribe called quest’s talked about
the rise of racist racist problems and
racist hatred in this country
[Music]
or we hate you wait okay so you guys are
sitting there right now thinking all
right that’s great thank you for the
beats this morning we could need we need
a little wake-up call at this point what
does this have to do with Shakespeare
okay Shakespeare lived in England you
don’t get more Anglo than that he knew
nothing about America’s problems of race
500 years ago okay 500 years later after
the time that he wrote so what does this
guy know okay but this is the genius of
Shakespeare okay this is the brilliance
of Shakespeare Shakespeare wrote a play
called a fellow and the fellow is a
story about a great black general trying
to make his way in White Venice okay
Estella was sort of the Cam Newton of
the Venice war scene in a world full of
white coaches and white quarterbacks all
right and but a solo had a bigger even
most a bigger problem there
he wasn’t just black he wasn’t more you
know what it means to be a more that
means you’re a Muslim so this man is a
Black Muslim living in Venice located in
Italy home of the Pope for those of you
who took AP euro this year okay so what
is she what does a fellow do when he
gets to Venice a fellow finds a
beautiful white girl and he secretly
marries her and how does her father
react to this
our Father accuses a fellow of employing
um employing witchcraft to take his
daughter his father says whether a maid
so tender fair and happy so opposite to
marriage that she shunned the wealthy
curled darlings of our nation would ever
have to incur a general mock run from
her garden to the sooty bosom of such a
thing as thou to fear not to delight
judge me the world it is not gross and
since thou has practiced on her with
foul charms abused her delicate youth
with drugs and minerals so Desdemona’s
father what’s she saying she say there
is no way my pristine daughter would
hang out with you much less marry you a
fellow the Black Muslim general in
Venice
you must have draw
hugged her that’s the only way to do it
later on in a cell oh we meet the chief
antagonist Shakespeare’s teeth chief
sellers chief tormentor guy named jogo
okay and what does Yoko say about a cell
oh okay Yago explains again and again as
I have told thee I’ve told the often and
retell the again and again I hate the
more my cause is hearted Yahoo never
explains why he hates the more but one
could assume why does he hate the more
because he’s different because he’s
black Shakespeare focuses on racism
again in the Merchant of Venice with
Shylock chief antagonist in a play is it
you he sums up racism quite simply he
says I am a Jew hath not a Jew eyes as
not a Jew hands organs dimensions senses
affections and passions if you prick us
do we not bleed if you tickle us do we
not laugh if you poison us do we not die
and if you wrong us shall we not revenge
through these characters Shakespeare
like Tupac and Tribe Called Quest is
saying whether you’re black or white Jew
Christian or Muslim we are all people
we’re all the same underneath and that
was a theme that was relevant 500 years
ago when Shakespeare wrote it and it’s
obviously quite relevant today okay
perhaps you say all right so you know
really clever or you found this common
theme going on there let’s move on to
the next one here sex and partying and
drinking all right we know rap music is
full of these celebratory references
let’s take a visit with my personal
favorite jay-z
[Music]
you even gotta bring your purses out we
did oh yeah traces on okay so rock boys
in the building tonight and all the
drinks are on us guys let’s party let’s
celebrate not an unusual theme in rap
music Snoop Dogg said it more succinctly
than that when Snoop Dogg simply said
rolling down the street smoking in Indo
sippin on gin and juice right it’s as
simple as that that’s all that life is
about right according to our friend
Snoop Dogg here okay so that’s fine what
does this have to do with some English
dude who live 500 years ago what did
Shakespeare or his characters know about
drinking and partying and sex and all
that stuff actually quite a bit
Shakespeare’s works are full of
rabble-rousing carousing and drinking
and scattered among his many characters
are a number of guys that you might
refer to as players currently and I’m
sure they weren’t referred to that way
back in Shakespeare’s time but his works
are full of scandalous and salacious
references would be quite at home in the
works of folks like Ludacris and little
Wayne let’s take a look here at a number
of these references to drinking here
okay so if you take a look there it said
it says simply that we’re talking about
ale in drinks and pull up my notes here
if sack and sugar be a sin God helped
the wicked a quart of ale is a dish for
a king maybe parents of brothers and
sisters have thought that sometime I
would give all my fame for a pot of ale
and so on and so forth so all this
stuff’s out there saying hey Shakespeare
liked to party too
Shakespeare enjoyed his drinks he
enjoyed his ale enjoyed guzzling as well
okay so we have that piece covered what
about
this was Victorian England we don’t talk
about things like that not the way
that’s talked about in rap music well
you’d be surprised actually if you take
a look we’ve got all of these varying
lines from Shakespeare Hamlet says to
his girlfriend Ophelia that’s a fair
thought to lie between maids legs
Yago talking about a cell oh says your
daughter and the moor are making the
beast with two backs you don’t have to
be too creative to figure out what that
means okay and then in a play called
Titus Andronicus we have the first to my
knowledge at least the first yo mama
joke in which an upset son Chiron says
you have undone our mother and Aran was
pictured up there comes back and says
villain I have done thy mother okay so
we see again this common thread that
runs through Shakespeare and runs
through hip-hop let’s focus on our last
theme here gang warfare and violence
okay gang warfare in the thug life rap
music is sometimes criticized sometimes
praised for us focus on the thug life
and gang warfare Kendrick Lamar and good
kid bet mad city talks about life among
the Bloods and the Crips
if Pyro’s and Crips I got alone they
probably got me down by the end of the
song seemed like the whole city go
against me every
ministry okay all right so great and
there’s plenty of others out there
talking about the Bloods and the Crips
and gang warfare what does this have to
do with Shakespeare well quite a bit we
find similar instance of gang warfare in
unusual places such as Romeo and Juliet
Oh Romeo and Juliet that beautiful
romance what could that have to do with
any of this Romeo and Juliet is not
simply the story of poor star-crossed
lovers
Romeo and Juliet is a play about gang
warfare between two clans
the Capulets and the Montagues okay
these Capulets and Montague’s hate each
other and they go out through the course
of this play and I don’t want to be
spoil it for you guys but they go out
and they kill each other so if you take
a look at Baz Luhrmann’s film Romeo and
Juliet makes this really clear and here
you’ve got gianluca’s amo playing t-ball
and he comes up and says what drawn and
talk of peace I hate the word as I hate
hell all Montague’s in thee have at thee
coward and then he pulls his sword or in
the case of Baz Luhrmann’s film his gun
and they go at it okay so it got a
little of gang warfare here that’s cool
what about violence we all know that
hip-hop is filled with violence
sometimes it gets criticized for that as
well as jay-z puts it in his song threat
put that night take a little bit of life
from you
come on frightening yo shall I continue
it’s gone too young let us sing the song
I met it home to you lovely one signal
okay that’s pretty tough right I put the
knife to you I put the gun to you okay
the violence in today’s hip-hop is
nothing compared to Shakespeare in these
plays you encounter the most vicious
psychopathic twisted murders and
miscreants you could ever imagine
okay we have plays we’re an aspiring
prince kills off his brother the king
then he kills over his other brother
quit so he’s ahead of him in line to the
throne then he marries the wife of a guy
he killed earlier and then he kills off
his sister and his tiny little nephews
okay that’s Richard the third for you
another example how about we have a
situation where a prince poisons his
brother the king and then marries the
Kings wife and then tries to murder the
dead king’s son to be or not to be folks
that’s Hamlin third here we have another
one where we’ve got a jealous King who
suspects his baby is not his own so what
does he do he tells a woodsman take the
baby out to the woods and kill the baby
and the woodsman would have succeeded
but for the fact that the woodsman first
is eaten by a bear eat your heart out
for those of you who saw the movie the
revenant it gets pretty rough here too
and then maybe my personal favorite from
the movie Titus you’ve got two young men
who get angry at an aging general so
what do they do they snatch the generals
young daughter take her away they rape
her they cut her hands off and they cut
out her tongue so she can’t tell anybody
who did it all right and these are just
some examples in Macbeth alone there are
32 murders or deaths in Macbeth they
call it the Scottish play because it’s
bad luck to say its name but
something horrible might befall you okay
it doesn’t get more gangster than the
stuff that’s going on in Shakespeare’s
plays okay so we’ve got these common
threads but why am I telling you all
this why am i sharing this with you
really to help you guys understand that
all art and poetry certainly great art
in poetry share a common tradition at
the English language poetic and lyrical
tradition that may have started with
Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales
which was a scandalous work at the time
back in the 1300s continued 200 years
later with the notorious BA Rd
Shakespeare and now is reflected in
today’s hip-hop artists like jay-z
childish gambino and Kendrick Lamar that
the sometimes almost invisible thread
that began to unwind centuries ago
through the work of these contemporary
hip runs through the work of these
contemporary hip hop poets today they
are the voices of conscience they are
the voices of outrage they are the
voices shouting to be heard so for you
hip hop kids out there who think that
Shakespeare has nothing to do with you
give it a try see what wonders it might
hold maybe try to figure out why this
guy has been so popular for so long try
and figure out why everything from West
Side Story to The Lion King owes a debt
to Shakespeare Lion King scar the
jealous uncle kills Mufasa the brother
and then tries to eliminate his son
folks that’s Hamlet no disrespect to our
friends at Disney but they just swiped
that from Shakespeare and for any of you
cultivated parents out there who think
rap is a bunch of noise who think
hip-hop is really just this awful
indictment of music today open your
minds a little bit listen to songs like
we the people from Tribe Called Quest or
Empire State of Mind from jay-z and
Alicia Keys you may kind of come to
understand the brilliant poetry can come
from unexpected places now I’m going to
leave you guys with the words of
lin-manuel Miranda who’s perhaps the
first guy to perfectly marry hip hop and
theater into a seamless whole in his
popular musical you may have heard of it
called Hamilton when you have an
opportunity to experience new art when
you have an opportunity to hear new
music when you have opportunity to see
new or different theater do not throw
away your shot throw away
[Music]
thanks very much
[Applause]
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