“I don’t know if I have ever wanted people to buy or support something more in my life,” wrote the rapper Drake, announcing the publication of his first poetry collection, co-written with his longtime collaborator Kenza Samir.
People certainly bought the book, called “Titles Ruin Everything: A Stream of Consciousness”: Available for purchase only a couple of weeks ago, it has already sold out on the singer’s website and that of his publisher, Phaidon.
But, so far, reception has not been especially kind. DJ Khaled posted a somewhat cryptic video of himself seeming equal parts amused and confused as he read select lines aloud from the 168 pages, some of them blank: “I’m not making this up!” In Pitchfork, Samuel Hyland wrote, “Everything in Titles Ruin Everything could have functioned as an Instagram caption, a tweet, a lyric, or, perhaps best of all, a fleeting, unshared thought.”
Poet Hanif Abdurraqib summarized the project as “essentially a coffee table book of one-line jokes,” while Aris Kian, Houston’s poet laureate, called it a “goldmine of mediocre mic drops.” (Drake appeared to respond in an Instagram Stories post, brushing them off as “randomly angry poets.”) Other writers took to social media to poke fun at the collection — and, in some cases, to jokingly commiserate: “Kind of a relief to learn that even Drake finds it difficult to promote poetry,” wrote a fellow Canadian bard.
Drake joins a rich tradition of popular musicians dabbling in verse, with mixed results. (Not to mention the likes of Patti Smith, who pursue writing as essentially a parallel artistic career.) His project seems like a good occasion to revisit some especially memorable efforts from recent decades.