Transcript

The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance | Isaiah Hull | TEDxManchester

I need to collect a safe way don't stop my time yeah I'm not smoking I was gonna also play a song to hide myself oh you playing the time it's such a truck I love it I do it teto okay I'm not gonna be the post-show thingy because I just don't write people what I'm writing a book called hear me alright I'm writing a book called how to sell drugs TEDx event herb knows Erdos yeah never plead but to the audience of the book okay yep yep I work here at home actually I'm an OSHA that's just proof I work here it's fully because I'm a poet as well or like people call me a poet and then that's what I am but I mean like something clever Scott it's fully gone oh yeah that was it so if this doesn't if you see me here in like six moves and I'm ripping you take it Suzanne oh sure it's your fault because like this didn't go viral I mean so don't say hi to me really it up sob I'm a poet by name I'm a point by it I don't really uh not really a point I don't really call myself a poet not like poetry that much I don't really listen to or watch it I go to see poetry shows and stuff and yeah so I'm going to talk to you about poetry even though I didn't want to talk about poetry because I felt like I'd be self limiting and it's like you expect me to talk about poetry and whatever but yeah what if I didn't do it our put yeah so I was gonna do about Flat Earth Society and I was gonna do it about the idea of black privilege which is something I heard on the brilliant ideas podcast and I was going to talk about what you know versus what you believe because I believe that security guards in Sainsbury's hate me cuz they always me right but I don't know if it's because I look sketchy or if I found black I don't to play the race card and it looks like I got called streetwise in an article once I did a performance in Liverpool and they called me streetwise in the thing and I'm like but how am i streetwise because I don't exude that energy of streetwise this I don't speak about a part from a drug-dealing thing earlier I don't speak about you know I mean I did it to myself I'm not allowed to swear on this because my mom might watch you but I swear normally and she didn't know that either but that's better yo okay I'm from work I'm from Old Trafford it did it did it already okay so why why poetry I've got a book with me because I'm a terrible person I've got a lot to say and I don't know how to talk to people really I'm quite awkward what the kid yeah so that's insecure so people always ask me you know why poetry why poetry why is that the thing that you do it's a weird thing for people like me in my area to do as well it's not something that a lot of people from Old Trafford do I don't know if I can say that I feel comfortable saying that so I'm gonna say I'm gonna claim it right I had stuff so I don't know why poetry is a thing I don't know why I keep checking I don't know why poetry is the thing that I do maybe I should have been a rapper I do rap but maybe I should have been a rap or something cooler because the thing is I was never cool I never grew I think bro cool I wasn't cool I got I mean I think it but I think it bullied I don't be a lot fighting a bullet stop laughing it's not funny all right just carry elephant all I'm saying is it wasn't cool it's never been cool to do poetry so I was like why am i doing it because I thought if I wasn't cool I'd try and do something cool to redeem myself yeah yeah next one let's let's just go let's just go so origin story I don't have an origin story is tragedy or trauma occurs Wolverine did oh if you want to hear a poem at any point is for you put your hand down put no I'm not doing that but sugar right so yeah so so so yeah it wasn't as bad as Wolverines I started doing poetry in primary school they just gave it me for homework and then the they kinda just said yeah it's good so carry on I'm so I did I brought it back to the teachers and they like gave me that positive reinforcement that I was lacking because whatever and like it I did it for that so all right why as an 11 year old my why was so I can get the feedback the feedback was positive so that was my wife but I don't know why what my why is now I don't know why I'm still doing it and so that's what I'm gonna discuss with you am i doing it for myself I wasn't doing it for myself I wasn't doing it for the art I was doing it for the teachers to tell me that it was good and I don't think that was an honest thing to do I think that was kind of betraying the I it so sick that's me I looking all Moody and stuff I haven't been outside in a long time and then so now yeah I like how I look in that though yeah it's the next one so young identity is a organization it will be an organization it's under a parent company right now but young identity is where I learned to love poetry it's where I fell in love with poetry and then surely may an ally oedema co-founded it and it's it's it's homegrown and it's really good and they have workshops everywhere and they just gave me a new lease for life in terms of hearing other poets and not being alone in being the weird poet from prime know from a primary school because I'm not known for in primary school and it's not a cool thing it's just added more stress so stop laughing it's a serious TED talk I remember having a debate with myself about just my duty as a poet am I supposed to be writing about something and yes to what you like that's what you made entity taught me to challenges is my duty to I don't know my duty as a writer rather than whatever my duty as a writer and that's why when I say Oh trust that this is what people you know think I'm not really a support or anything but this is what I mean and you know you get that if you're from Old Trafford is anyone for more traffic in it fire alright see well this is what I mean this is what I mean this is a place and a my identity as a writer so what I'm trying to say is what I'm trying to say is one try to say is I said it three times so that you do you think that was stumbling but really I'm trying to get your attention to believe me the point and it caught ya a call yeah sorry yeah so do I have a Julie to talk about black issues because I'm black don't have a duty to talk about the play slam from because the place that I'm from places that are milestones in my like childhood so like the Seahawk lounge it was like a barn in my house and I learned to ride my bike outside of there and it's just getting turned into like flats or a Tesco and this is happening all around Old Trafford and all around here as well and it started to feel like you know intrusive on my childhood because now my memories I don't have a place to reflect them in real life I can't show my kids or if I have kids whatever yeah so I felt like my wife should be changed to you know see for the people rather than for myself I'm spitting everywhere okay in it yeah high school so I hated high school obviously I told you already what was the point in this life so this slide is like it's just me yeah so in high school I would draw a lot and I would write a lot and yeah that's was gonna say it's it's about the the reason I wrote in high school was for escapism so I hated high-schooler so what I do on the side is a little rebellion Act would be write poetry and and draw and be so creative in rebellion to the monotony of high school that I hated but now oh yeah then I went to college and then the more free time I had the less and less that I you know rose for myself and it was a way it was a weird thing because I felt like I have all the time in the world this is perfect like you know you repudiate media and stuff he had a cave that he used to go to in a Macedonia I think and he would write in that cave and I had this idea this ideal idea of the Euripides cave which is my room that I just write in and I never have to come out and I can just slip poetry under the door and someone will slip back up 50 pound or something and I'll live I'll live off that I'll live off that but I've come to realize no I have to live life I have to do something because if all I can do is write I know that I'm drowned in the the idea of why it will it's more hindering oh yeah so this is a clip I don't even know if we can show how I've known for a time so I'm gonna skip over it all right slam poetry so I don't know I've had conversations with a poet John bercovich and he is talking about how slam poetry wasn't a thing it's a genre that's been created and about how easy it is well I think it's easy to be a poet now because there's no gatekeepers and there's no and it shouldn't be you know you can't you can't have a gatekeeper for are any if I throw the pen on the floor that's our if I say so and no one else can challenge me on that but what worries me about slam poetry is that it feels like it's dilute in the I don't know dilute in the economy of poetry sounds like a good thing to say also I'll say that yeah once it yeah so yeah I feel like it's easy so people can just google this and they'll see the million no shame to these people I even giving them a chance to be fair but I mean they'll see millions of views and it seems like there's a four a little poetry that you can just follow and it's a lack of originality so they'll have buzzwords I know how you know they'll talk about Donald Trump because it's relevant and they'll talk about the Syrian crisis it's not out of a genuine feeling but out of this will get me clicks in an open mic night and this will get me feeling like I did something and I really reject that because I don't feel like it's true and I think if you're not gonna say it better or originally if you're gonna say it better and it's already been said or try at least try to then why say at all and that's something that I think about on my own so originality is something I mentioned and the way that I visualize it in my head in the terms of poetry the more of a poet you see and if you have the title so you have the Pioneers which and it's relevant to your generation so for me it would be maybe that big John Cooper Clarke am a terror and then you have underneath that I love I love Greek mythology so much so I love the total void I just love it it gets me going man and you know all of them Titans they're like Prometheus he gave fire to humans and Frodo and they all got punished for it as well it's so symbolic for yeah so John Cooper Clarke would be that era to me anyway and then the gods would be like my mentors that taught me and then I wouldn't say I'm a demigod at all I'm not saying that I'd be somewhere much further below because I was taught by those that were taught by the gods as well if I'm making sense am I making sense just tell me yes anyway yeah a lot more I do so the Y so Y is important because the wide drives me the Y is is something that you can't be it you can't be scared in whatever you do in your life you can't be scared to ask yourself why you doing it creatively I feel like it's important to challenge yourself and if you just ignore it it's just going to keep growing and then it's going to be a bigger problem for you down the line follow me on Twitter Isaiah is a liar yeah Jonah June appointment cuz I lied to 20 left all right Jonah has a really uplifting end of the day TED talk II poems about life yeah I don't write any like happy poetry is all sadness and gloom you there yes don't look at you I wrote you a poem last Tuesday and you weren't there to read it it was a five-minute poem in a box full of eyes with a body that God couldn't hide her diary was a longer book a wise man once wrote in when she spoke the Fox shuddered twice sounded like a knife sliding through hot butter or a box cutter she spoke like that wearing the coat dyed black hair in an old spice rack I stood there with a bowtie waxed smoked I laughed she didn't emotes like that she was wine in a hot summer and I was dining like job hunters do and lived on an island she stopped looking to bulletproof like like coffee no bulletproof like newborns bevery didn't plywood two-by-fours inhale he holds the new high score forlorn as a fruit fly when the trees die in the meantime he singing killing me softly killing me softly killing me softly killing me softly put a pill in the coffee life would be easier with liquor and Moxie and licorice I'm only sweet-hearted when the women are watching I'm sat here in a box and killaby softly that's a poem for me wait I'm sorry thank you James laughing this is really good man it's really good for my self-esteem this man I'm not thirty Seconds to apologize for how sky brained and terrible has been so that the apology Thanks [Applause]