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10th out of 82 books
—
24 voters
Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop
by
Adam Bradley
If asked to list the greatest innovators of modern American poetry, few of us would think to include Jay-Z or Eminem in their number. And yet hip hop is the source of some of the most exciting developments in verse today. The media uproar in response to its controversial lyrical content has obscured hip hop’s revolution of poetic craft and experience: Only in rap music can...more
Paperback, 272 pages
Published
February 24th 2009
by Basic Civitas Books
(first published December 30th 2008)
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The problems with Adam Bradley's Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop? Where do I start? That the only references to female MC's are 2 sentences about Lauryn Hill, and one reference to Mc Lyte, Roxanne Shante, Sha rock, and Jean Grae? That there are no-count em-no references to Queen Latifah, Salt and Pepa( or Spinderella), The Mercedes Ladies or TLC? Or that his choice in hip hop is so throughly modern, as in his slavish defense of lil Wayne at a time where millions of black people aren't int...more
He's trying to get people who respect poetry to respect rap music as a poetic form and at the same time he is trying to encourage hip hop heads to take the vocabulary that already exists for discussing poetry and use it to improve how we talk and think about rap. Where these audiences overlap is hard to say, but I do think he mostly succeeds, and he does get into more than just the literary and poetic terminology we learned if we'd paid attention in high school English. It is also fun when he dr...more
This at least begins to combat the notion that there's no such thing as "hip-hop lyricism." It's becoming trendy for the last generation of poetry scholars to acknowledge that hip-hop can be poetry, however I bet most would be hard pressed to reel off lyrics and even fewer would attempt to teach it in a class.
I was in a high school class the other day where the teacher played Bob Dylan and passed out copies of his lyrics. Probably that was titillatingly subversive when it was done in the class r...more
I was in a high school class the other day where the teacher played Bob Dylan and passed out copies of his lyrics. Probably that was titillatingly subversive when it was done in the class r...more
I wanted this book to either teach me the technicalities of rhyme in an entertaining way or teach me about the history of rhythmic structures in rap, but it was mostly disappointing on both counts. It would be better attached to a freshman poetry class with a professor going into more detail where Bradley falters. In fact, I got the feeling this book was written for freshman poetry class. It was also written for people who don't actually listen to rap (from the horrible intro describing what a r...more
I really like the concept of this book and I think that Bradley's style of writing and analysis is perfect for a rather light book. Unfortunately I was rather dismayed by Bradley's lack of diversity of rap artists. Perhaps he wanted to make this appeal to the more casual/contemporary hip hop fan, but Lil Wayne is not very good and he seems less so when you hold his lyrics up to analysis. I feel like that a lot of examples he used could not hold a candle to some old school stuff that he ommitted....more
Disclosure: I'm into poetry and prosody, wrote my masters thesis on poetry, and also am deeply interested in and ambivalent about hip hop as a poetic form. Not only is hip hop a (the only?) poetry that is popular in the marketplace -- it's gone a long way to reshaping the scene of popular american songcraft as well. Many interesting things to be said about it, and I am ready to get into that conversation.
So the good thing about this book is that in reading it, I got to spend a lot of time readi...more
So the good thing about this book is that in reading it, I got to spend a lot of time readi...more
Drop all your biases against rap and hip hop. If you want to know how reach thousands if not millions of listeners and (ahem) readers with poetry, this is a great book to start. "Book fo Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop" is both an introduction of sorts to hip hop and rap and breaks down how rap/hip hop is one of the most popular forms and dynamic forms I would add of poetry that;s on the air and hips of young and old day and night. Adam Bradley, the author, breaks down the revolution (my word) ra...more
Library Journal Review:
With hip hop’s tremendous growth over the last decade the amount of literature covering the genre has grown considerably. Yet, very few books have been written that are devoted exclusively to the poetic elements of hip hop. Having studied under such luminaries as Cornel West and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Adam Bradley is emerging as a pioneering scholar in the study of hip hop. In the Book of Rhymes Bradley shows that rap can be analyzed as literary verse while still recogniz...more
With hip hop’s tremendous growth over the last decade the amount of literature covering the genre has grown considerably. Yet, very few books have been written that are devoted exclusively to the poetic elements of hip hop. Having studied under such luminaries as Cornel West and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Adam Bradley is emerging as a pioneering scholar in the study of hip hop. In the Book of Rhymes Bradley shows that rap can be analyzed as literary verse while still recogniz...more
Very deep analysis of both rap's close connection to poetic forms and devices and the stylistic differences that distinguish MCs, like voice, flow, subject matter, etc. I felt like he could have gone more into some other aspects of hip-hop culture like live performance, collaborations, remixing - but otherwise, solid book. Definitely listen to the tracks he mentions as you're reading.
Looking back at “the Humpty Dance” it’s hard to take hip hop too seriously as a form of poetry... by reading this book, though, you'll see a good argument made for the seriousness of hip hop and rap; the true meaning and intensity of these lyrics. It gives good reasons as to why these are some of the most important developments in poetry in the last thirty years.
The book is a good introduction to someone who doesn't understand the poetry in rap. I find that is basically a brief view of comparison between a poetic concept and application to rap lyrics. I found that nothing was really greatly developed, just touched on and onto the next comparison.
started out a great literary analysis of hip hop and devolved into a page filling report on style, perception and general facts about hip hop, as seen through the eyes of the author. it's as if he had a report to write for 11th grade english, and just had to hit a certain number of pages. Read the first 100 pages and that'll be enough.
A friend of mine loaned this book to me and my wife.
I want a copy for our shelves.
A must-read for those that love hip-hop and the written word, as well as for people that just don't understand the appeal of hip-hop.
I want a copy for our shelves.
A must-read for those that love hip-hop and the written word, as well as for people that just don't understand the appeal of hip-hop.
Taking the interesting premise that rap is the most widely disseminated poetry in the history of the world, the author explores what makes hip-hop what it is, and why we should care.
It had some interesting ideas about the connection between poetry and hip/hop, but it would be annoying in its writing execution, with ideas scattered around.
Disappointing, to say the least. This book, which claims to be about the "poetics" of hip-hop, is in fact a very pedestrian, shallow look at the most obtuse and evident aspects of hip-hop. (He dedicates 40 pages to repeatedly explaining the concept of rhythm. Really dipping into the platitudes too in having the chapter on wordplay be straight up explanations of fairly evident lyrics.) Disappointing to say the least, a decent primer for the non-listener but for anyone who has heard a hip-hop trac...more
Not bad, but not what I was expecting. An interesting read nonetheless.
I thought it was very interesting!
This was a really interesting look as hip-hop as the most widely consumed form of poetry in popular culture.
In my opinion, this was an excellent book that gives you a lot fo information on hip hop as a poetic practise.
This book could have done with a lot more examples/close readings and fewer generalizations about how hip hop is really poetry (yes, I believe you, that's why I'm reading this book). Still, great to read an academic book that says Andy Samberg's "flow is quite good."
I thought this was going to be interesting and something I could reference in my teaching of poetry, but it is too musically technical to be useful to me. Someone with more of a background in music may appreciate it more.
A great read! Thorough start to a conversation, and was insightful for me on various literary traditions. Now I have to do my homework and analyze all the lyrics quoted for myself.
(Six Word Review) Kudos for comparing Cam'ron to Homer.
BOOK OF RHYMES by ADAM BRADLEY..
Literary scholar Adam Bradley’s new book BOOK OF RHYMES demonstrates the connection between old school literary poetry and the rhymes of today‘s lyricists. Bradley utilizes a litany of lyrics and classic lines of poetry to support his claims. Each chapter is packed with analysis and anecdotes. The chapter titles are poetic devices: Rhythm, Rhyme, wordplay, Style, storytelling and signifying. Citing lyrics from Big Daddy Kane, Eminem, Nas, Jay-Z, Lauryn Hill, Rakim...more
Literary scholar Adam Bradley’s new book BOOK OF RHYMES demonstrates the connection between old school literary poetry and the rhymes of today‘s lyricists. Bradley utilizes a litany of lyrics and classic lines of poetry to support his claims. Each chapter is packed with analysis and anecdotes. The chapter titles are poetic devices: Rhythm, Rhyme, wordplay, Style, storytelling and signifying. Citing lyrics from Big Daddy Kane, Eminem, Nas, Jay-Z, Lauryn Hill, Rakim...more
Jun 15, 2013
Claire
marked it as to-read
Jun 12, 2013
Chelsea
marked it as to-read
Jun 09, 2013
Tara
marked it as to-read
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“Hip-hop is a beautiful culture. It's inspirational, because it's a culture of survivors. You can create beauty out of nothingness.”
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8 people liked it
“MCs don't just rhyme sounds, they rhyme ideas.”
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3 people liked it
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