The Dead Emcee Scrolls: The Lost Teachings of Hip-Hop

by Saul Williams

In the underground labyrinths of New York City's subway system, beneath the third rail of a long forgotten line, Saul Williams discovered scrolls of aged yellowish-brown paper rolled tightly into a can of spray paint. His quest to decipher this mystical ancient text resulted in a primal understanding of the power hip-hop has to teach us about ourselves and the universe around us. Now, for the first time, Saul Williams shares with the world the wonder revealed to him by the Dead Emcee Scrolls. I have paraded as a poet for years now. In the proc ess of parading I may have actually become one, but that's another story, another book. This book is a book that I have been waiting to finish since 1995. This is the book that finished me. The story I am about to tell may sound fantastic. It may anger some of you who have followed my work. You may feel that you have come to know me over the years, and in some cases you have, but in others...well, this is a confession.

Genres: Poetry, Music, Nonfiction, Hip Hop, Contemporary, Art, Literature

208 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 31, 2006

About the author

Saul Williams is an acclaimed American poet, musician, actor, and filmmaker whose work fuses raw political insight, lyrical intensity, and a bold disregard for genre boundaries. Widely recognized for his dynamic presence in both spoken word and alternative hip hop, Williams emerged in the mid-1990s as a vital voice in contemporary poetry before expanding into music, theater, film, and literature.
Born in Newburgh, New York, Williams studied acting and philosophy at Morehouse College and later earned an MFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. It was in New York's vibrant poetry scene that he honed his distinctive voice—fusing personal narrative, political urgency, and rhythmic precision. His breakout came in 1996 when he was named Grand Slam Champion at the Nuyorican Poets Café. He soon co-wrote and starred in the film Slam (1998), a bold meditation on incarceration, art, and resistance. The film won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and the Camera d’Or at Cannes, launching Williams into international prominence.
Williams has published several collections of poetry, including The Seventh Octave, Said the Shotgun to the Head, and The Dead Emcee Scrolls, which reflect his ability to merge the cadence of hip hop with spiritual and philosophical inquiry. His writing is known for its fierce social critique and experimental form, often pushing beyond traditional poetic boundaries to embrace typography, performance, and digital culture.
As a musician, Williams has created a genre-defying body of work that blends hip hop, punk, rock, electronic, and spoken word. His debut album Amethyst Rock Star (2001), produced by Rick Rubin, was followed by the critically acclaimed self-titled Saul Williams (2004). He collaborated with Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor on The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust! (2007), a provocative, pay-what-you-want release that challenged music industry norms and addressed race, identity, and digital freedom. Later albums such as Volcanic Sunlight, MartyrLoserKing, and Encrypted & Vulnerable further showcased his global perspective and political urgency, incorporating influences from African rhythms, industrial noise, and cyberpunk aesthetics.
In theater, Williams originated the lead role in Holler If Ya Hear Me, the Broadway musical inspired by the lyrics of Tupac Shakur. As an actor, he has appeared in films like Today, Akilla’s Escape, and Neptune Frost—the latter of which he co-directed with Anisia Uzeyman. Neptune Frost premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and exemplifies Williams’ vision of “sonic fiction,” combining sci-fi, Afrofuturism, and social commentary in a deeply poetic cinematic language.
Williams is also known for his global activism, his commitment to nonconformity, and his exploration of identity. He describes himself as queer and has consistently used his platform to advocate for justice, equality, and creative freedom. His life and work reflect a boundary-crossing ethos, uniting the spiritual and the political, the poetic and the revolutionary.
Across all mediums, Saul Williams defies categorization. Whether through verse, film, or song, he invites audiences to question, to imagine, and to awaken. His artistry continues to inspire new generations of poets, musicians, and thinkers worldwide.

Reviews

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Okay, You’re probably wondering what's a white girl from Vermont doing reading this? Oh, and she’s also… French Canadian. (shudder)

I know, I was too. I mean, I really have nothing in common with Saul Williams, I grew up in suburban NH where the ‘hood’ was a mile long strip mall and it was considered dangerous to hit TJ Maxx on a Friday night.

This being said, I was mesmerized. Granted, I had to have whole parts translated to me, but it was beautiful. I want to be a Saul Williams groupie. I want to follow him around and bask in his teachings.

Fireplace is in the heart Water places the art
‘round the islands of desiring where most primitives
stalk, sacrificing their daughters. These primordial
waters carry a feminine agenda that no man ever
taught us.


Or.


False idols, false Gods. Revering false titles.
Peep dude with platinum cross. He floss
bibles. Check vitals. Revivals. Father, son in
denial. Throw mama from the train and derail
every child.


Do I pretend to know what he’s seeing? No. I just go along with the ride and sigh.



It’s best seen though, I found this over the weekend. Enjoy.

[Rowena · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great one by Saul Williams. It offers a social commentary on the importance of hip-hop in the African-American community in particular, and the unfortunate misogynistic turn hip-hop has taken (the main reason I don't listen to it anymore). Most of the poems in this book are hip-hop inspired, so perhaps a little knowledge on the history of hip-hop from the 80s onwards would be beneficial.

Many of the poems are also activist and political in nature.A few are very personal. Some bemoan loss in culture and the unfairness in society. They also talk about self-discovery, which I found to be quite inspirational.

As always, Williams' word choice and word play is brilliant.

A great book to finish 2012 with.

[chantel nouseforaname · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always come back to this book every couple of years. It’s got some of my favourite lines of poetry and power in the text.

Sometimes I wonder what Saul thinks about this work in the years that have passed, how it would be worked and reworked with the knowledge gained now and with the movement of hip-hop as it traverses time.

Some of my favourite lines of poetry ever written is:

“If not then you must be trying to hear us
and in such cases we cannot be heard. We
remain in the darkness, unseen. In the center
of unpeeled bananas, we exist. Uncolored by
perception. Clothed to the naked eye. Five
senses cannot sense the fact of our existence.
And that’s the only fact. In fact, there are no
facts.
Fax me a fact and I’ll telegram a hologram
or telephone the son of man and tell him he
is done. Leave a message on his answering
machine telling him there are none. God and
I are one. Times moon. Times star. Times sun.
The factor is me. You remember me.”

Saul is a one of a kind. A unique mind.

[Joshua Donellan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saul Williams is unquestionably one of the most important poets currently breathing. His contributions to hip-hop and modern poetry include film, theatre, poetry both written and performed as well as a number of vastly creative albums. This book compromises selections from some of his best work over the years as well as new work. It's a piece that manages to be political and personal, transcendental and introspective, joyful and furious.

"Pupil my sight with orange balls of light
And echo my plight
Through the corridors of metaphor
What else are we living for if not to create
Fiction and rhyme?
My purpose is to make my soul
Rhyme with my mind
Mind over matter
Minds create matter
Minds create fiction
As a matter of fact
As if matter were fact
Matter is fact
So spirit must be fiction"

If anyone ever trots out that irritatingly popular misconception 'all rappers ever talk about is guns, drugs and bitches,' throw some Saul Williams their way and let them have their 3rd eye squeegied.

[Autum · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*** I enjoyed this authors own personal mind more than the scrolls themselves. He had some really interesting and correct things to say. A lot of the information he talked about was very insightful and I appreciated his take on things.

[j]

I dig so much of the verse in here, but it really only comes alive when you set it to music. I'd put on a jazz record and rap it. Some of it comes across as hammy or obvious in print, but you can imagine how it would come alive in the contexts Williams has placed his words into on his recordings. What I really dig though is the more essayistic sections, which are endearing for how well they relay Williams's passion and frustration alike.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book of poetry about hip-hop. And it is hip-hop. The Lost Teachings of Hip-Hop. Another reviewer stated that they didn't come away with any more of an understanding of hip-hop than before. The book seems to be more geared towards those already familiar with hip-hop. But even then, I don't think it's going to give a whole new understanding because chances are that if you're reaching for this book you're already in line with what Saul is saying about the state of hip-hop.

The book is about more than hip-hop though. Just like Saul's music it's about life, love, finding ourselves, living up to our full potential, freedom. Those very things that Saul states that hip-hop was created for and can still bring about.

"I have learned the importance of stories, the importance of dreams (night and day), the need to look beyond mirrors, the flow of energy, the hindrances of 'control dramas,' the inconsistencies of time, the inaction that self-consciousness leads to, the reality of the 'unreal,' the universal source of energy, the beauty of all things, the unity of all things, that coincidences aren't, that love cannot be specified (kinda), the ineptitude of belief, death only comes to those who believe in it, life only comes when you're not reading writing, or thinking about it. 'Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans.'"

[Scotty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every so often, I start to forget what it is that I find so electrifying about Saul Williams. When that happens, I just go read or listen to some of his work, and I remember.

His words, the way he blends, moves, and rhymes through, the double- and triple-meanings in everything. The back-to-back phrases like a clue from Jeopardy! and we just have to work out the relation(s).

If you know Saul Williams' work, I don't need to say much more about it. If not, here's a quick favorite excerpt.

"How could you not
Realize the power of word
After being forced
To serve a sentence?"

[Caitlin Vaille · Rating 4 out of 5]

"We drum the essence of creation from city slums. But city slums mute our drums and our drums become humdrum 'cause city slums have never been where our drums were from"

Imagine finding an abandoned spray paint can filled with scrolls of indecipherable language. Now imagine spending seven years of your life decoding these lyrics. Saul Williams did THAT! These were fluid and pointed poems from both the original author and Saul.

[Matt Sautman · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this volume, Saul Williams becomes a hip hop Walt Whitman, transcending through ghetto culture and black history by the means of a musical/poetic salvation, aided with a scholastic perspective, enabling him to comment upon society with an academic persuasion through his timely lyrics and occasional prose that make the Dead Emcee Scrolls one of the best collections under his name.

[Che Howes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Summary-
As the Author Saul Williams enters the abandoned subway graffiti station. He is introduced by the art on the wall called graffiti. As he is exploring he finds a not so empty graffiti can filled with brown crumpled scrolls of poetry that’s cryptic. Saul begins to decode them and it takes many years to decode them, but he is finally done and now he shares the knowledge inside them with us readers. These pieces represent the real art of hip hop and the changes it has made throughout time, and now Saul Williams brings us along on our journey through rap culture.

Overview-
In my honest opinion this book really opened my mind to music. It’s like it opened up my third eye and now I see music and especially hip hop totally different and now I appreciate it more. I definitely recommend this book to hip hop fiends.

Cons-
The cons of this book is insane, but it depends on how you view this book, pros and cons can get difficult based on different views. As I was reading I couldn’t find too many Cons in the book, I mean it uses “harsh” language but I don’t mind it, in fact I like because he’s being real to us. Probably the only Con is that some of the poems are so powerful that I’ve had to reread them a lot and try to wrap my head around them, but that increased my brain power. In my point of view there wasn’t any cons about the book. There might be for other readers of this book.

Offensive Content-
This is just like Cons, it’s all based on opinion, but if I was to generally talk about it, yes there is a lot of offensive content. He uses the ‘b’ word but spells it BCH. Or he talks about real life event like sexual abuse and abuse in general. He also uses the ‘n’ word but also spells it NGH. I love that he does that, it shows that he cares about the strength of the words so he uses them, but he doesn’t spell them out correctly but you’ll still know what it means. There’s also gun violence and gangs involved, but it’s all realistic and connected to hip hop.

Pros-
The Pros of this book is very high for me. It’s almost like the short story A&P, it’s based on very realistic events and he’s informing us the reality of hip hop and poetry. He doesn’t hold back on his poems either. The way he produces the power in the poems is out of this world, I’ve noticed myself bobbing my head back and forth rhyming and singing to the book. His influence on rap has greatly increased after he released the scrolls of dead emcees. I love hip hop so this book is straight up Pros. He explains gangs and violence and racism all in his poetry about hip hop. It’s all so realistic, I’m tired of all the fantasy things about life, we all need reality.

Two Excerpts-

“I am the streets. The white lines only separate me from me. You hydroplane in false gods name and still crash into me. Sign and tree, mountainside, guardrail into the sea. They thought they stole you from my arms then carried you to me” pg.14

“Your existence is that of a schizophrenic vulture who thinks he has enough life in him to prey on the dead, not knowing that the dead ain’t dead and that he ain’t got enough spirituality to know how to pray. Yeah, there’s no repentance. You’re bound to love an infinite, consecutive, executive life sentence” pg. 57

[Francis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saul Williams continues to be an incredible poet speaking from his experience as Black man immersed in hip-hop and art, and reading this and recognizing what he has utilized in his own art was fascinating. I immediately recognized parts of NGH WHT in his song "Black History Month" off the great album "The Inevitable Rise of Niggy Tardust", or the Amethyst Rocks and Sha Clack Clack poems used in his performance in the Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning film "Slam", and the reading of Co-Dead Language at De Poetry Jam which I watched on YouTube over a decade ago. Fascinating to see some of my favorite lines come from this manuscript he found in a spray-paint can. So much of the Dead Emcee part of the collection is just so rhythmic and the images just pound into you and I let myself just kind of fall into it and let the images wash over me. The second half, with Williams's journal entries was not as exciting but still showed some gems of thoughts that I recognize as typical of Williams's early collections of poems. To trace how these first Dead Emcee poems influenced his voice is quite interesting. I also love how he both in the early 90s and today continues to call out the misogony and the hyper-fixated focus on material wealth in hip-hop and rap, and how damaging that is to our collective psyche, and it is for this reason that I love his music which utilizes so much of the early hip-hop sounds that I love (Black Sheep, Pharcyde, Native Tongues collective types) but without lyrical content that would make listening to the songs difficult. If you enjoy his music, slam poetry, or socially-conscious poems from a positive voice in Black poetry, this is for you. Definitely worth going back and reading, years after buying this book.

[Richard Magahiz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the essays at the beginning and the end of this book, where he talks about some of the purported origins of his verse and his views of the state of hip-hop in the 21st century. It's hard to tell how much to take the claim of ancient mysterious found scrolls as the original source of the rhymes in his debut album Amethyst Rock Star, but it makes a good tale and probably does have at least a germ of truth about his writing process.

I usually have a hard time finding my way in to rap lyrics written out on a page. At times I will find a striking phrase, a surprising rhyme, a sense of the pulse of the line. So for the most part, I read through this section quickly to get a sense of the variety of the pieces and the range of subjects that flash through them. They were interesting enough to make me want to stream some of his recorded work to try to get a better idea of how they compared to their origins.

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saul Williams is such an impactful artist and thinker.  I remember how much I loved Slam when it came out, saving my money to buy a VHS copy, and I remember how he challenged us to really think critically when he came to speak to my college class.  I'd always wanted to have his works written down, although reading I instead felt the urge to watch Slam again.  Powerful thoughts and powerful in performance. 

[Cassie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Non-Challenge Book: Ever since I first put my ears to his self-titled album, I was hooked on Saul William's poetry and philosophy. When this book came across my desk, I knew I wanted to do a deeper dive. And I'm glad I did. I had too many questions at first, but the longer I read, the more those questions got answered. It was difficult reading while listening to music (any music, even his) because I kept hearing melodies and drums in his language.

[christina · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book of poems was pretty good, they read more like a rapper's freestyle notebook. I honestly enjoyed the hip hop essays at the beginning and end of the book more than the poems themselves. These are just not as strong as the poems in his other two books "she" and "said the shotgun to the head". If you like hip hop, try this one out –if you like poetry DEFINITELY read his other books.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Keeping this unique book of hip-hop-fueled poetry within reach for the rest of my life. What surprised me most was the storytelling that was entwined around familiar verses from Saul's music. Highly recommended to lovers of thought-provoking hip hop.

[Mike Hammer · Rating 3 out of 5]

saul is a fine rhythmic poet with unique viewpoints
i am actually listening to his album Martyr King Loser now
and his pieces
i think
generally come thru better as performance - songs or slam poetry etc - than as a book

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is the kind of book where you have to read your favorite pages out loud because it’s so intricate and literally just so clever and masterfully written - I’m probably going to read it over and over

[James Kramer · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was OK. A little enigmatic at times and some of the particular themes were opaque, but the main thesis of hip-hop/emceeing becoming more "capitalistic/misogynistic" as opposed to it's more pure roots was clear.

[Jonathan Holleb · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best book he has written. Essentially reading for any hip-hop head.

[Errol Orhan · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is well mapped out, but really not for me.

[Jae · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the greatest poets of all time

[Tim Dailey · Rating 5 out of 5]

RIP muMs

[Tania Bies · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're looking for ancient urban magic, you HAVE TO READ THE DEAD EMCEE SCROLLS. There is no story like it. Totally real, human, magical, captivating, down-to-Earth from space... Saul Williams has a gift and he knows how to use it. x

[Eva]

Q

[Alland Beward · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorites. Definitely would recommend.

[monchichi ⋆｡°✩ · Rating 5 out of 5]

No words for this one quite yet.

[Robert Beveridge · Rating 2 out of 5]

Saul Williams, The Dead Emcee Scrolls: The Lost Teachings of Hip-Hop (MTV, 2005)

I was really impressed by , said the shotgun to the head, the first Saul Williams book I read, and so I reached for this one as quick as I could get my library to loosen its taloned grip on it. Pity that, because The Dead Emcee Scrolls has all the things I didn't like about , said the shotgun to the head and none of the things I did like about it.

Oddly for a poetry book, the best parts of The Dead Emcee Scrolls are its prose. (Save the obligatory tip of the hat to 9/11, which seems omnipresent in today's American poetry books.) Williams starts us off with a thirty-page tale—how tall it is is left to the reader to decide—about how he came upon the Dead Emcee scrolls, which he asserts are not his work. In fact, he tells us, he found them rolled up in an empty spray-paint can while on jaunt through the abandoned subway tunnel of New York City with a friend. It's a great story, and becomes even better when he starts talking about his travails in deciphering the coded language found therein (anyone who's ever tried to puzzle out graffiti tags will be able to identify). Then, in the rest of the first half of the book, he presents us with what he came up with. I started doubting the veracity of the story early; there are a few cultural references that come from more recent events than Williams' supposed discovery. As well, Williams tells us, these are hip-hop lyrics (and unlike Williams, I do make a distinction between hip-hop lyrics and poems). True, that, at least mostly. There are a few times when the poems do veer off into the realm of actual poetry, or at least something approaching same, but for the most part they conform to Williams' analysis of hip-hop; these are, in his words, cries for power. The obvious logical leap there is that in these pieces, the message is more important than the medium; if you've read any random three poetry reviews I've written in the last twenty years, you know exactly what I have to say about that without my saying it, so I'll leave off flogging that particular dead horse for the nonce.

But the prose? Luminous. Williams is one hell of a storyteller, and he's also one hell of a media critic. The second part of the book consists of journal entries from the years he spent transcribing/translating/writing/etc. (1994-2001) as well as an essay about hip-hop occasioned by a chance meeting with Hype Williams in 2001. Saul sees himself and Hype at opposite ends of the hip-hop spectrum; Saul is interested (and invested) in the golden-age rappers like Run-DMC, KRS-One, and the like, while Hype, in Saul's eyes, personifies the new, greedy, violent age of hip-hop (he was, after all, the producer of the film Belly, and the mogul behind such new-school rappers as Jay-Z and DMX, both of whom Saul specifically name-checks here). “[Hype:] asks me if I listen to hip-hop. I tell him that I study it, but that I cannot listen to it in most cases for the same reason I don't eat meat: I don't like how it feels in my system....He wants to know if I remember Public Enemy, KRS, Rakim...I tell him that I have difficulty listening to contemporary hip-hop because I can't forget.” (168-169)

About that I can give a whole-hearted “Amen”. With two exceptions (Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. And Dirty Wormz, both notable for actually having a band to go along with the DJs), the hip-hop in my music collection over the years began with Run-DMC's King of Rock and ended with NWA's 100 Miles and Runnin'. Yeah, they were angry young men with a message, but it was a message that they knew how to get across; the whole more flies with honey thing, you know? Run's braggadocio was always humorous, Eazy-E was a storyteller as much as he was a rapper. (“8 Ball” is still my favorite NWA track.) And Williams (Saul, not Hype), when he's declaiming on the state of hip-hop in America at the dawn of the twenty-first century, is dead on. I could read a whole book of Saul Williams' music criticism, and I'd probably be thrilled with it. Here, though, there's not enough to balance out the verse material, which is banal. **

[Nick Black]

So I'm not much into modern poetry (how on earth does one start, or even get bearings? You may well be diving but I, I am merely sinking), but you've got to keep trying things out. Anyway, if you've missed Blackalicious's epic performance of Dr. Williams's "Release (Parts 1, 2, 3)" on 2002's Blazing Arrow, go acquaint yourself with some of the most daring, innovative, inspiring rap made this decade -- seriously, go do it; the album's an epic achievement and represents everything good about hip-hop. His imagery's a bit more informal than I like from a PhD, and I've really no patience for "social commentary" written after 1980 or thereabouts (c'mon, if you can't make it now, you never could've made it, so shut up and go generate economic output (but see note below)), but his lyricism's outstanding and I am a real sucker for these lines:

...Catchphrases and misunderstandings
But they are not what I feel when I am alone
Surrounded by everything and nothing
And there isn’t a word or phrase to be caught
A verse to be recited
An iamb to defile my being in those moments
I am blankness; the contained center of an “O”
The parametric containment of an “A”
I stand in the middle of all that I have learned
All that I have memorized
All that I’ve known by heart
Unable to reach any of it
There is no sadness
There is no bliss
It is a forgotten memory
A memorable escape route that only is found by not looking
There, in the spine of the dictionary the words are worthless
They are a mere weight pressing against my thoughtlessness
But then, who else can speak of thoughtlessness with such confidence
Who else has learned to sling these ancient ideas
Like dead rats, held by their tails,
So as not to infect this newly oiled skin?
I can think of nothing heavier than an airplane
I can think of no greater conglomerate of steel and metal
I can think of nothing less likely to fly
No wings more weighted...

beautiful. We'll see how this goes.

ps: things like this are said because they're fun to say. please don't turn my goodreads into a political debate. i'm well aware of how horribly insular and banal this comment comes off, i promise.

pps: the political debate restriction does not apply to Apple Computer, whose policies do more to hold back humanity than stem cell opponents and anti-nuclear activists put together. Every time I see one of those stickers, I want to take a sledgehammer to the pretension-cart on which it rides. You people are more obnoxious than Opus Dei and would find yourselves beside the Khmer Rouge on Judgement Day if the whole concept of the Judeo-Christian value function F() wasn't an undefined bunch of rubbish.

ppps: but even Apple confounds me less than the idea of "natural diets". we're all pulling up chairs at the same periodic table, folks. don't let the organo-farmergrocer complex turn you into little eichmanns. remember: nothing is too big to be knocked on its ass and everything is cool, baby.