Letter Written By Tupac Shakur From Prison Just Before His Death Up For Auction
When Tupac Shakur was serving a sentence stemming from a sexual assault conviction in 1995, he apparently wrote a letter to his friend, Nina Bhadreshwar, who at the time was working at Death Row Records label and the editor of Death Row Uncut magazine.
Included in the one-page note was a separate four-page explanation of his philosophy entitled "Is THUG Life Dead?" Bhadreshwar was quoted saying, "He (Shakur) enclosed a five-page essay on his view of the rite of passage of a young black male in America. And that was the beginning of our real correspondence."
"The thug in me started buggin from withdrawal from my previous medicated state and under the pressure I nearly lost my mind," Shakur laments as he contemplated his newly sober existence behind bars. He urged "all the Souljahs of this Nation 2 examine and evaluate your lives. Are u ready 4 the next level! I Did not begin thug life I just personified it."
Launching into a rambling manifesto aimed at young black men, he penned this 4-page manifesto recounting his life before jail as well as injecting his own views and visions for the young black Americans. He set off his attempt in a literary pitch by outlining his own adaptation of the stages of man (American black man), starting with his so-called "DustKicker" which typically evolves into "Thug." And then, according to Shakur, if man survives the thug phase, he can attain the highest state of all: "BossPlaya."
In the long-winded sometimes incoherent penned dociment, Shakur wrote, "(Many) never survive the next level of Thug Life... They become addicted to death. A True Boss Playa knows when to advance (sic)... U must play the game, not let the game play u (sic)... A regular Playa plays women (sic)... a Boss Playa plays life (sic). A Boss Playa is a thinker, a leader, a builder, a moneymaker, a souljah, a teacher and most of all, a man (sic)! I want all my homiez to know there is another level (sic)."
In his letter to Bhardreshwar that come with his manifesto, Shakur instructed: "It's long but it's true. Use it as U see fit. I am not granting this information 2 any other publication, not even Time & Rollingstone. So please represent it."
"Hopefully this will do some of u some good," wrote Shakur from Clinton. "If it does then I don't sit in jail in vain. I'll see y'all in about 18 months."
This particular Tupac Shakur letter that appears to renounce the "thug life" he embodied is now up for sale. Moments in Time, the seller who is said to be a purveyor of precious historical paperwork, is selling the 5-page manuscript for $225,000.
“It's a fixed price, first-come-first-serve offer,” according to Gary Zimet, owner of Moments in Time.
20 years after his death, the Shakur prison letters is divulged to the public and is being sold, but only to a buyer with BossPlaya money.