GLR November-December 2022

cence about his gradual acceptance of the world of cyberspace, then tracks the history of racial relations at Kenan’s alma mater (UNC–Chapel Hill), and concludes with a quotation from Zora Neale Hurston’s autobiography. That Kenan’s encyclopedic lit erary knowledge is on display here as he quotes sources rang ing from alternative journalist I. F. Stone to Greek poet C. P. Cavafy doesn’t really save the essay from being desultory and inconclusive. Semantic elusiveness undermines “That Eternal Burning,” an incantatory meditation that ultimately evades meaning. A similarly unfinished quality undercuts “Chitlins and Chimichangas: ASouthern Tale in Black and Latin (AProposal for a Documentary).” Although this piece showcases Kenan’s heralded culinary interests, the essay remains just that—an un finished attempt. To those who argue that a volume of this nature must in evitably be uneven, I would point to the posthumous nature of the project. In the absence of the author’s guiding hand, no ed itor is credited. Repetitions over the course of the volume might have been excised, articles might have been dated, and the prin ciples of selection might have been clarified. An editor’s intro duction could have been added to Tayari Jones’ tribute. As it stands, the volume seems like a marketing tool capitalizing on the stellar reputation of a beloved author. Randall Kenan de serves better. Nevertheless, the compelling power of Kenan’s prose ele vates this imperfect collection. As he reminds us in “Love and Labor,” a superb essay on the writing process, “the proof is on the page.”

Randall Kenan. Photo credit: Flyleaf Books.

father and a snapshot of his problematical relationship with his birth mother. And social commentary inevitably occurs. Kenan observes upon a return visit to his hometown, for example, that “Chinquapin was becoming more like the rest of America. It was being absorbed by the vast cultural soup of consumeristic we-think.” Miscellaneous essays treat such subjects as Ingmar Bergman, Eartha Kitt, and Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton . Each piece includes a number of digressions, often inform ative and diverting but sometimes producing a sprawling or disjointed effect. The essay “Where Am I Black Or, Something about My Kinfolks,” for example, starts with Chinquapin rec ollections, moves to a discussion of the TV series Star Trek and a defense of the genre of science fiction, returns to an account of his grandfather’s life, then jumps to a treatment of an African-American computer hacker, which leads to a reminis

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November–December 2022

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