Legacy

Why did the US vice president want Tupac’s debut album pulled from shops? What did Tupac see in a newspaper that made him write ‘Brenda’s Got a Baby’? And, what happened when the persona he built began to take over? In Part 2 of the Tupac Shakur series, Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch trace his rise from young rapper to film star and a target in America’s culture wars. After a Texas state trooper is killed, the defence points to a cassette of Tupac’s debut album. Vice President Dan Quayle calls for the record to be withdrawn. As the backlash grows, Tupac is making films with Janet Jackson and writing songs about Black women whose stories rarely make the headlines. Peter and Afua ask what his Thug Life tattoo was meant to say, and how much of the character he created he could leave behind. Join Legacy Plus for bonus episodes, early access, Q&As, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm 00:00 The cassette at the centre of a murder case 01:29 How Tupac’s debut became a national controversy 03:46 The story behind ‘Brenda’s Got a Baby’ 09:23 Tupac goes to Hollywood 18:39 The women Tupac wrote about 20:55 What Thug Life meant to Tupac 27:24 The confrontations that followed fame 30:21 The case that leads into Part 3 Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Content warning: this episode includes discussion of war, killing and the ongoing violence in Gaza. Why did a cactus in an empty Palestinian village become the start of a novel? What happens when the ghost of a girl killed in 1967 asks a teenager from North London for help? And, why did Amy's tutor tell her, aged 20, to choose another cause? Peter and Afua talk to novelist Amy Abdelnoor about her debut, Ever Land. Amy volunteered in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon and lived in Ramallah during the Second Intifada. Ever Land follows two girls. Safa is a Palestinian girl killed in the 1967 Six-Day War, who can't move on until she finds her little sister. Dinah is a Jewish teenager from London who moves to Israel decades later. Amy talks about the cactus plants that still mark emptied villages, why she chose fiction over non-fiction, the email that told her there are "two sides to every story", writing grief, and her Lebanese grandfather. Join Legacy Plus for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm 00:00 Introduction 03:07 What Ever Land is about 03:56 Why a ghost? The cactus in the empty village 08:25 Why fiction, not history 11:16 "Two sides to every story" 15:30 Writing as the world changed 20:46 Writing grief 24:05 Ghosts in the landscape 27:31 Is Safa every ghost? 30:30 Amy's Lebanese roots 33:40 "Choose another cause" Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Content warning: this episode includes violence, drug addiction and references to sexual abuse. How did a pregnant Black Panther with no legal training defend herself against 156 charges, and win? Why did she name her son after the last Inca ruler, executed in Cusco in 1572? And, how did a ballet-dancing theatre kid become the rapper a US vice president said should never have been released? In the first of four episodes, Peter and Afua begin the story of Tupac Shakur. Thirty years after the shooting in Las Vegas, a jury has finally reached a verdict. But Tupac's story begins much earlier, in a Manhattan courtroom in 1971. His mother, Afeni Shakur, is on trial as one of the Panther 21. She is pregnant, she has sacked her lawyer, and she is facing life in prison. Peter and Afua follow her from North Carolina to the Black Panthers, and through the FBI's war on the movement. Then they follow her son. He grows up through New York, Baltimore and Marin City, and the episode ends with his first album. Join Legacy Plus for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. In this series, members also get bonus interviews with a former member of Tupac's crew and a filmmaker. legacy.supportingcast.fm 00:00 Las Vegas, 30 years on 03:26 Afeni Shakur joins the Panthers 06:34 Hoover, COINTELPRO and the Panther 21 10:46 Pregnant in jail 11:39 Afeni defends herself 15:23 Why "Tupac"? 20:47 A revolutionary family 24:11 Baltimore and the School for the Arts 29:46 Marin City 32:36 "Same Song" and the first album Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What were British soldiers doing in Palestine in 1945, between the oranges, the swimming and the bombs? Why does the Christmas show in Sebastian Faulks's Jerusalem swap Gilbert and Sullivan for Oscar Wilde? And, how did a novelist who plans everything end up with a twist he never saw coming? Sebastian Faulks tells Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch how his father's posting, hundreds of hours of soldiers' memories and a much-missed friend became his new novel, Farewell to Eden. His father was sent from Italy in late 1945 for what the army called "rest and peacekeeping", and was there when the King David Hotel was bombed. Sebastian built the book from the Imperial War Museum's sound archive, a 1949 diary kept by the Uruguayan member of the UN committee that drew the borders, and the memory of his closest friend, the Guardian's Middle East editor Ian Black, who first explained it all to him in their first week at Cambridge. Plus Amos Oz's grandparents, who thought Palestine was "too Asian", a padre's vision on Easter Saturday, the grey "tundra" of post-war Britain, and why Sebastian had to unlearn the idea that happy endings are vulgar. Join Legacy Plus for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm [0:00] Oranges, sunshine and a storm coming [2:22] A boarding school, October 2023 and an old friend [5:52] His father's "rest and peacekeeping" in 1945 [15:17] The Irgun, a bombing in Rome and no easy sides [18:53] Faith in the Holy Land, and a Christmas show in Jerusalem [24:51] The twist even he didn't plan [26:56] How grim post-war Britain really was [29:43] Why happy endings aren't vulgar [33:04] Crosswords, coffee and 1,000 words a day [38:14] A diary from 1949 and the UN's impossible job Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Come and join us live! On Monday 16 November, Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch will be on stage at Kings Place in London with the wonderful Elif Shafak. Her extraordinary new novel, In One Brief Moment All Eternity, tells the story of Gustave Flaubert, the creator of Madame Bovary, through the eyes of the women whose lives shaped his, and whose stories have largely been forgotten. It's about who gets to tell history, whose voices are silenced, and why literature matters, especially in times of turmoil. The book comes out the day before, so this is a rare chance to hear Elif talk about it, and about history and memory, with us. Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/legacy-live-elif-shafak-in-conversation-with-afua-hirsch-peter-frankopan-tickets-2003929321545 Or through the Kings Place box office. More Legacy Live events are on the way in late 2026 and 2027. To hear about them first, join Legacy Plus for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more. legacy.supportingcast.fm Stay connected with Legacy: Instagram: @originallegacypodcast TikTok: @legacy_productions Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.