I have decided to write my essay about Tupac Amaru Shakur because he is an icon of liberty, freedom and a person that never gives up. What is more, he is a strong character. He was a pioneer of hip hop and rap. He even created his own style of ‘gangsta hip hop’ and then he mastered it to the perfection. His texts were related to serious problems in the USA like racism and utilization. Besides, I love his way of rapping and freestyling.
Tupac Amaru Shakur was born in Harlem, New York on June 16 1971. He died while driving with his friend knight as a result of gun fire wounds on September 13 1996. He is considered now as one of the most influential rappers of all times.
Tupac was also known as 2pac or Makaveli. His real name was Lesane Crooks, but after joining Black Panter party, his mother, Alice Faye Williams, changed his name into Tupac Amaru. As we can see from his early years he was fighting for equal rights for Afro-Americans. Tupac's family was poor and moved often from place to place and often stayed in shelters. As they moved to Baltimore Tupac joined the local school of arts, because of his talent – very high poetry skills. As he said, he felt there really understood and respected, “the freest of all the times”. But it wasn’t good much longer… his Baltimore neighborhood was driven by crime, so his family moved to California where he met his friend knight. He left his dreams in the school of art and - like Robert Sam Anison wrote in Tupacs biography about the young rapper - the move to California meant “a little ghetto” for Tupac and his artistic skills. In the big city, California, Afeni - sister of Tupac succumbed addiction to crack and started having health problems. But the interesting part is that Tupac sold crack on the same street where Af’(Afeni) bought her supplies.
Luckily, Tupac’s love to hip hop, songs and poetry steered him away from a life full of crimes. As Leila Steinberg recalls to the reporters “I’ve met a young man with overflowing charisma and fan-like eyelashes while walking in the park”. They ended up having a conversation about Winnie Mandela. At this time Tupac was really interested in freestyling and Hip Hop was even stronger. He joined a band “son of P” and a month later Tupac debuted his own album “2pacoalypse now” as a solo artist. But later on, after rising to fame, he said that he was misunderstood. It was at this time when Biggi (Notorious BiG) started creating. He said that the perfect album is about the hard times. His words of wisdom were to change into reality. While walking down the street Tupac was attacked by jealous youths. In the melee a gun fired and killed a 6-year-old by-stander. Parents of the victim brought a civil case against Tupac but the judge annulled the court meeting and other criminal proceedings, so the artist was not charged for killing the child.
Tupac was killed in a car while driving with his friend knight. To these days the killer wasn’t found – the file of murder is unsolved, but probably for a person responsible for the assassination was one of his rivals or enemies from the past.
Tupac is an icon. Till now thousands of his albums are being sold worldwide, but what makes him really important and original was his charisma, poetry talent and that he had never given up in his way to the glory.
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