Things I Learned From Listening to Eminem: 7 Writing Tips

I’ve already explained that I’m an English teacher who listens to Eminem. I’ve found out from Wikipedia that much greater minds than mine have already pointed out his lyrical mastery. “Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney has praised Mathers for his “verbal energy” and for arousing popular interest in poetry and lyrics.” There you go.
Here are some of the things I’ve learned from Mathers:

1. Writing is its own reward. It’s good for your soul to just get it all out sometimes.

I sit back with this pack of zig zags and this bag
Of this weed it gives me the shit needed to be
The most meanest mc on this — on this earth
And since birth I’ve been cursed with this curse to just curse
And just blurt this berserk and bizarre shit that works
And it sells and it helps in itself to relieve
All this tension dispensing these sentences
Gettin this stress that’s been eatin me recently off of this chest
And I rest again peacefully (peacefully).

2. Say what you’re going to say, then say it. Em has always stated that he had a shitty life and finds himself with this talent and he intends to parley it into money for himself and his daughters.

Though I’m not the first king of controversy
I am the worst thing since Elvis Presley,
to do Black Music so selfishly
and use it to get myself wealthy
(Hey) there’s a concept that works

3. Know your audience. Writers write to communicate, so they explain what they mean in a way that works. If drugs, cussing, and violence are what work, that’s not on Em, that’s on us. Supply and demand, baby.

We just explain it and then we get our checks in the mail
it’s fucked up ain’t it?

4. Don’t give up.

I was playin in the beginning, the mood all changed
I been chewed up and spit out and booed off stage
But I kept rhymin and step writing the next cypher
…
Success is my only mother fucking option, failure’s not
Mom, I love you, but this trailer’s got to go
I cannot grow old in Salem’s lot
So here I go it’s my shot.
Feet fail me not
this may be the only opportunity that I got

5. Write what you know. If you’re faking it, people will know. You know more than you think, and the act of writing will help you flesh out the wisdom you’ve gleaned from living.

It’s my life, I’d like to welcome y’all to the Eminem show…

6. Tell the truth. Even if you have to split yourself in half. The Slim Shady persona is extreme, but it works for him. But he’s not expressing anything we haven’t all felt.

I’m like a head trip to listen to, cause I’m only giving you
things you joke about with your friends inside your living room
The only difference is I got the balls to say it
in front of y’all and I don’t gotta be false or sugarcoat it at all

7. Have a sense of humor. Don’t take yourself too seriously.

Hi kids! Do you like violence? (Yeah, yeah, yeah!)
Wanna see me stick Nine Inch Nails through each one of my eyelids? (Uh-huh!)
Wanna copy me and do exactly like I did? (Yeah yeah!)
Try ‘cid and get fucked up worse then my life is? (Huh?)
My brain’s dead weight, I’m tryin to get my head straight
but I can’t figure out which Spice Girl I want to impregnate (Ummmm..)