Holler If You Hear Me: Searching for Tupac Shakur

This book offer more than just a look at this undeniably great Poet called Tupac, it also looks at the HipHop-culture describing why so many black people uses the "N-WORD" and goes all the way back to slavery to explain this, also the "B-Word" and others reasons in hiphop gets explained (which could be great if for example Right-Wing people like Bill O'Reilly would read this, becouse he is always attacking rappers on his show the factor)...
It's a good book and Michael Eric Dyson is a good writer , u can actually picture Tray-Dee from The Eastsidaz sitting at the dinner-table crying in an interview he did about Tupac in the book.
4 Stars: Quality Stuff

Tupac Amaru Shakur may not have been Hip Hop's "best" rapper of all time, but he is hands down, without question, the greatest and most compelling Hip Hop FIGURE, of all time. what amazes me so much about Tupac is how he seems to represent so many different things to so many different people.Some people see Tupac as nothing more then a foul mouthed Thug who got what he deserved when he was killed. Other people see him as a Hip Hop Martyr/revolutionary who was on the verge of becoming a great leader, when he was killed. Then their are those who who don't think of Tupac as anything more then a dead rapper. While others see 2pac as not only the voice for his genre, but rather the voice for his generation.To me, the truth is, Tupac was/is probably a combination of all those things to some degree. He is and probably will always remain the only true ICON in rap.Like I said earlier, he wasn't the best rapper, he wasn't the best lyricist, he didn't have the best metaphors, he wasn't the best battle rapper, but it was just somthing about him, something about his charisma, someting about his passion, something about his emotion, something about his words, something about his voice, that just somehow seemed to separate him from everyone else.If their was one M.C. who deserved a book written about them and their life, Pac was clearly that person.

I gave this book 4 stars, but it really deserves about a 3.5 star rating. The book is supposed to be about Tupac, but Tupac only seems to be a vehicle for Michael Dyson to discuss Young Black Males as a whole. That's all fine and dandy, but I didn't buy this book for that.I bought this book to get insight on Tuapc, and in terms of that, this book dissapointed to a certain degree.But what really grabed me in this book was when they were talking about his experiance in prison. They talked about how he may or may not have been raped. To me, that was nothing more then what it was, a rumer. A lot of people don't know this, and something they should have added in the book, right before he went to prison and after he was shot 5 times, he was suicidal.In fact, at his house one day, his family caught him sitting in a living room with F**k the world written across his forehead and a 45 pistal he was pointing at his head. Now imagine, on top of everything else, how he would have reacted, if the most degrading, humiliating thing that could possibly happen to a man(or women for that matter), happened to him, on top of everything else.Ive digressed.

The bottom line is, this would have been a very enjoyible book, sans all of the big words as well as all the interviews with people who not only didn't know Tupac but in all likelihood, never even so much as seen or came in contact with the brother before(Stanly crouch,Kephra Burns,Mos def Talib Kweli, Bishop T.D. Jakes, Ray Jay, Sonia Sanchez,ect.).In fact, I really don't even know what buisiness they had even being put in this book(W/ all do respect to all of them).The book Title is called; "Searching For Tupac Shakur" not, "What people who never even knew Tupac Shakur think about him". If you want a real book on Tupac Shakur, and only Tupac Shakur, Then you should pick up Darrin Bastfields book on Tupac.This, buy no means,is a bad book however.

and so it may be unfair for me to give an opinion but sense i am a book worm, the kind that prides myself on reading a book in one day, I feel that I am experienced enough to pick up a certain sense of the author by the first chapter.

Now, in saying that, so far, from what I've read, I feel the authoer (Mr. Dyson) is trying to appeal to people outside of hip hop because it is as if he's saying that Tupac was more than a thug, or there was something very dynamic about his thug formula at the same time tragic (to say the least).

There's no doubt in my man that Tupac (r.i.p.) was an intelligent person to some level because of how he articulated his words and I knew he had some grass root flavor because the brother was straight up real in what he was saying (interviews, appearences) outside of his music. But I feel that Mr. Dyson is trying to tell the world (white world?) that Tupac was a very soulful and artistic person who was gotten trapped inside of his art that lead to a very tragic ending; that he (tupac had more to offer the world) before his early death.

I feel that who ever Mr. Dyson was trying to reach with his semi-autobiography of the slain star is very least insulting towards the average person's intelligence because history dictates that once a person is stuck with interest by a person, place or thing, that person will go out on their own to find out more information about the object of their attention (be it elderly white rock n' roll types, blues people, whoever) and in saying that, perhaps, this type of mindset is who Mr. Dyson was aiming at.

Another thing that bothers me about hip hop journalism in general is that in general, I don't know who were the true ideal reader that these books are meant for: are they for the true hip hopper or is it the true hippor and a more broader reading base (with high literary skills?) because whenever I read this types of books (3 so far) I need a thesaurus next to me. And I figure hip hop isn't about using big words, and so if one wants to write about the art form, they have to also think like the fan and not like themselves to make a core impact. Not that I'm saying this book hasn't made a good impact (look at the other reviews) but when one makes a comparison (and you should), I like Chuck D's book, "Fight the Power" because it's simple, down to earth, and honest. Infact, I was surprised how Chuck D honest approach throughout the whole book because he was humble and not egotistical or biased.

Anyway, read the book, like I'm continuing to do so and judge for yourself.