is there anything Mos Def can do?
If there is, he’s not saying. By Veronica Chambers He is just 30, but already the rapper/singer/actor known as Mos Def embodies a fresh individualism rarely seen in today’s bland, focus-group-approved world of entertainment. He has starred onstage, in movies and on TV. He has huge hip-hop credibility, but he’s also an accomplished musician who plays bass, vibes, keyboards and percussion. And his literary aspirations go beyond hosting the popular “Def Poetry Jam” on HBO: He’s a former co-owner of an independent bookstore, Nkiru Books, not far from where he grew up in Brooklyn. Quietly charismatic, Mos Def lets his diverse work speak for itself. But the performer, born Dante Smith, refuses to play the role of the artiste. Instead, he describes himself as a “99- punch kid. If you hit on me 100 times,” he says, “I’d be like, ‘OK, I’m gonna break you.’ ” Notoriously press-shy (or is it press-weary?), he is fiercely private, insisting that neither his personal life nor his thoughts on his cr
