M. Randal O'Wain's Meander Belt is a Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius for the 21st Century

Meander Belt, the new memoir by UNC’s M. Randal O’Wain, is a heartbreaking work of staggering genius for the 21st century.  The 'a-ha' moment for me came in the chapter titled ‘SUPERMAN DAM FOOL’, when O’Wain—who must be of a similar age to me—detailed the Death of Superman in DC Comics Superman #75, when “Rows of bloody Ss filled the racks.” This chapter is told in short staccato bursts, with the narrative jumping back and forth between the author’s squalid circumstances and those of the villain Doomsday, Superman’s eventual killer.

Meander Belt has nothing to do with superheroes, and O’Wain is certainly no Superman (at least not in the traditional sense), but the usage of the Death of Superman as a cultural touchstone is done brilliantly, and lends to the atmosphere of the moments that O’Wain gifts us with in a way that many who grew up in this era will appreciate.

The subtitle to Meander Belt is “Family, Loss, and Coming of Age in the Working-Class South”, and as such, this is not a pretty book.  In fact, it is gloriously messy.  It is a book about taking the path less traveled, about taking the hard way out, and about choosing the gloriousness of experience over the ease of tradition. It is a gritty city book about death, drugs, sleezy propositions in sticky alleyways, and the shadow of Leonard Cohen. It is a book about the inevitable heartbreak suffered between a father and son when the son is ready to become a man and the father is not ready to let him go.

In the end, Meander Belt is a revelation.  M. Randal O’Wain is signaling his presence to the pantheon of great North Carolina writers.

M. Randal O'Wain will be at Quail Ridge Book on Wednesday, October 9th at 7pm with Mesha Maren, author of Sugar Run.