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Lafayette will experience the classics in a new way as Dirk “Baba” Brinkman brings “The Rap Canterbury Tales” to campus, starting with a writing workshop noon Monday, Nov. 20.
The workshop, which will be held in the Marlo Room of Farinon College Center, will be followed by an acting workshop 1:45-2:45 p.m. in Pardee Hall room 120. Brinkman and company will perform “The Rap Canterbury Tales” 5 p.m. in the Williams Center for the Arts, Black Box Theater.
“We’re sponsoring this event to explore the connections between the classics and contemporary poetry, between pop and high culture,” says Suzanne Westfall, professor and head of English. “This is Baba’s first visit to campus, and we hope students will take advantage of a variety of events that explore writing poetry, performing rap, and viewing theater.”
Brinkman began his rap career at 19, freestyling and writing songs in his hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
During his development as an emcee, he also completed both a B.A. with honors from Simon Fraser University and an M.A. in medieval and renaissance English literature from the University of Victoria. His thesis drew parallels between the worlds of rap music and literary poetry.
In the summer of 2004, Brinkman toured his hit theater show, “The Rap Canterbury Tales,” to seven cities around the world, including Prague, Montreal, Edinburgh, and San Francisco. In the fall of 2004, he completed the album version of “The Rap Canterbury Tales” and, in the spring of 2005, he was sponsored by Cambridge University to tour over 30 schools across England, performing for over 1,600 students.
Since 2004 he has toured almost constantly with “The Rap Canterbury Tales,” including a tour of Australia and frequent returns to the United Kingdom. Brinkman recently recorded his third independent full-length LP, “Lit-Hop,” featuring Josh Martinez, Moka Only, and 10 original songs co-produced with United Kingdom hip-hop artists.
“The Rap Canterbury Tales” has also been published as an illustrated paperback by Vancouver’s Talon Books, Canada’s premier independent literary publisher.
“His residency is the best of both worlds – entertaining and educating,” Westfall says. “Baba takes the original Middle English poetry and explores how it can be ‘translated’ into contemporary rap. He updates, he rhymes, he exploits rhyme, all without ever losing sight of the original language and culture.”