RaveThe New York TimesKenan, as this book demonstrates, never aspired to be the next Baldwin in any literal sense, and much as he admired him, he had a complicated relationship, as a standout Black, gay, male writer, to the inevitable comparisons...More inclined toward the ancestral, the numinous and the folkloric, Kenan poses a question to his godson: \'Did you know, once upon a time, Black folk could fly?\' Referencing the legend of Africans who escape enslavement by flying home, Kenan’s letter dreams a path forward using resources that lie deep in the past...This applies to the whole of \'Black Folk Could Fly,\' a collection of essays that, while less known than his celebrated fiction — many appeared as introductions or in small magazines — provide rare insight into Kenan’s life and mind, while retaining the humor, humanity and elegant power for which he is loved...In a sense, the collected pieces function as memoir, or as a series of love letters to the forces that shaped the writer.
