FATHERALONG

by John Edgar Wideman

Being "black," "coloured," or "African American' -- define it as you will -- isn't a guaranteed condition of misery.

It's a mindset responding to the physical and existential tax that's levied on every dream and aspiration according to one's degree of pigmentation -- otherwise known as race.

Two-time PEN/Faulkner award winner John Edgar Wideman says that our obsession with race is preventing understanding of the real similarities and differences between peoples living the Americas.

In his latest book, Fatheralong, Wideman chronicles his 1992 pilgrimage from Amherst, Massachusetts, to rural South Carolina.

His destination, a community called Promised Land, is the focal point for an exploration of black people's fate in societies past, present and future.

The place where they all meet is the "Great Time" of African ancestry.

With his father Edgar riding shotgun, the author's loose modus operandi is to find the family's lost roots. This means logging hour after hour alone with a father he barely knew as a child.

Wideman's scholarly grasp of the black experience at the grassroots, and his literary poise, which has garnered awards across all cultural lines, makes this read part rap session, part historical text.

And it's eye-popping in the truth and clarity of its message. It careens from wails echoing from a death ship's hull in the Middle Passage to the gasp of the dope runner dying to make a buck.

What emerges is the voice of a no-nonsense, tough-talking, militant black intelligence that's searching for ways to forge a coexistence among all people.

Fatheralong is much more than just fathers and sons -- it's an all-encompassing meditation on race and society.

--sigcino moyo

original publication: NOW