The Egg

by Sherwood Anderson

"There is within every human being a deep well of thinking over which a heavy iron lid is kept clamped."

From Sherwood Anderson's second short story collection, The Triumph of the Egg (New York: Huebsch, 1921), pp 46-63; originally, "The Triumph of the Egg," in Dial, number 68, March, 1920.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Family, Classics

ebook

First published March 1, 1920

About the author

Often autobiographical, works of American writer Sherwood Anderson include Winesburg, Ohio (1919).

He supported his family and consequently never finished high school. He successfully managed a paint factory in Elyria before 1912 and fathered three children with the first of his four wives. In 1912, Anderson deserted his family and job.

In early 1913, he moved to Chicago, where he devoted more time to his imagination. He broke with considered materialism and convention to commit to art as a consequently heroic model for youth.

Mainly know for his short stories, most notably the collection Winesburg, Ohio. One can hear its profound influence on fiction in Ernest Miller Hemingway, William Faulkner, Thomas Clayton Wolfe, John Ernst Steinbeck, and Erskine Preston Caldwell.

Most important book collects 22 stories. The stories explore the inhabitants of a fictional version of Clyde, the small farm town, where Anderson lived for twelve early years. These tales made a significant break with the traditional short story. Instead of emphasizing plot and action, Anderson used a simple, precise, unsentimental style to reveal the frustration, loneliness, and longing in the lives of his characters. The narrowness of Midwestern small-town life and their own limitations stunt these characters.

Despite no wholly successful novel, Anderson composed several classic short stories. He influenced Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald and the coming generation.

Reviews

[George Ilsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This 100-year-old short story begins with a description of life on a chicken farm:

One unversed in such matters can have no notion of the many and tragic things that can happen to a chicken.

But who are the chickens in this story, and who is the egg?

One hopes for so much from a chicken and is so dreadfully disillusioned. Small chickens, just setting out on the journey of life, look so bright and alert and they are in fact so dreadfully stupid. They are so much like people they mix one up in one's judgments of life.

And so it goes. Hopes are raised only to be dashed. Humour and the frustrations of everyday life all nesting together. The "American spirit" of ambition is seen as a kind of curse, or folly — a beckoning siren luring the ambitious to their fate. The twists and turns of this story, and the clever unreliable voice, made me laugh.

Sherwood Anderson was friends with Gertrude Stein, and the two of them used to get together and grouse about Ernest Hemingway, who no longer visited. "We taught Hem everything," they'd say, and that was that. Another literary dust-up baked from the traditional recipe of cutting remarks, snide asides, jealousy, and hurt feelings.

I believe this is the first work of Sherwood Anderson I have ever read. Rounded up to 5 stars because there is a town named Pickleville, which is tremendously satisfying to say.

[Joselito Honestly and Brilliantly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I imagine literature professors giving this as an assignment for their students to read. As it would be obvious to the latter that the egg (L'uovo) here symbolizes something, discussions would center around this symbol of whatever the imagination would conceive it to be a symbol of.

Here, the egg, a chicken egg, proved resistant to a father's efforts to use it for his modest ambition to improve his family's lot a little bit. He ends up crying in a desolate surrender, without rancor against the egg which frustrated his efforts, and which he bequeaths to his son as a lifelong mystery to ponder on.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Giving it four stars because I listed to the Public Domain Theater episode, which was hilarious.

[Kristi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I laughed out loud at the tale of the egg - "all philosophers must have been involved with eggs." I have two reasons to laugh. I grew up on a farm in Iowa. As soon as I was old enough one of my jobs was to gather the eggs from the hen house. Many hens do not like to give up their eggs - I wore gloves. The funniest memory, however, involves baby chicks. Every spring my father would purchase 100 chicks that we would raise to about 3 pounds and then prepare them to be fryers - good eating. In our de-assembly line I was the feather plucker......... Even more hilarious, however, was the day the chicks, which had been kept in the brooder house under warming lights until they turned from fluff to feathers, were finally allowed to roam the grove. We came out from lunch to find that Penny, our toy terrier ( not the farm dog ) had killed a dozen chicks and piled them up as a present outside our front door. My father - all 6 foot 4 inches of him - was not happy. I was worried about my dog. My dad took the dog and one dead chick into the crib alley. Now these limp chicks were like dust cloths. He hit her lightly about the head with the limp chick. Suddenly he came out and very quietly told me he was sorry, but he had killed my dog. As I started to cry, Penny staggered out of the building. She had been so mortified by being struck that she fainted dead away!!! She never killed any more chicks. Those chickens and eggs were very tasty, but they involved a lot of work. Kristi & Abby Tabby .

[Shan]

Un bracciante dell’Ohio e sua moglie, una maestra di campagna, decidono, per il futuro del bambino, di salire la scala sociale. Si buttano così sull'allevamento di polli, ma è cosa ardua, molti pulcini si ammalano e molti polli diventano mostruosi sviluppando due teste o 4 zampe. Il figlio della coppia passa la sua adolescenza nello spleen più completo per la morte aviaria e l’insuccesso dei genitori. Così dopo il disastro dei polli la famiglia si trasferisce proprio di fronte la stazione di Pickleville, vicino a Bidwell, e intraprende l’attività ristorativa per i viaggiatori e la popolazione di Bidwell. Ma anche questa nuova scelta imprenditoriale, benché inizi bene, ha un epilogo tragicomico. Il padre pensando di intrattenere i viandanti con numeri da grandguignol ( mostra loro i corpicini dei polli polimorfi sotto spirito, tenta battute e numeri di giocoleria con le uova) ottiene effetti indesiderati sui clienti disgustati. La rabbia del padre con un uovo in mano condensa il super potere dell'uovo ed il suo trionfo in un' America che presto affronterà lo spettro della grande depressione.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished reading the audible version of “THE EGG” written by SHERWOOD ANDERSON and narrated by CATHY DOBSON. This is the wonderful story of a young boy, brought up on an unsuccessful chicken farm, whose impoverished parents try their luck at running a restaurant. The father, not a natural showman
by nature, attempts one night to entertain the sole diner with tricks which use eggs. The result is disastrous.

[Gibson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Prima o poi finisce in frittata

Racconto breve che vede l'io narrante di un figlio descrivere le azioni del padre che, insieme alla propria moglie, ad un certo punto viene assalito da una sorta di 'ambizione' sociale, improvvisando soluzioni quanto meno bizzarre.

Più piacevole che altro.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars

[Cidolfus · Rating 4 out of 5]

A shaggy dog story about eggs and OP's hatred of chickens. Man, his dad was nuts.

[Randy Tramp · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of a Father, as seen through the eyes of his son. One line in the book: "I am a gloomy man inclined to see the darker side of life, I attribute it to the fact that what should have been for me the happy joyous days of childhood were spent on a chicken farm.

I enjoyed the "inner view" of a boy towards his father. Affected by his, somewhat cheerful father, and at times not so upbeat, the son relates his view. It was a refreshing, and at times comical look at relationships within a family.

[Janith Pathirage · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice little short story by Sherwood Anderson. Its in his second short story collection, "The Triumph of the Egg". This guy has a ting for eggs it seems. I like the way he has kept things simple in this tale, without boasting too much about the characteristics of his heroes. Ideal read for a rainy day.

[hamatesus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adam bir yumurtayla Amerikan mentalitesini, bir civcivle hayatı özetledi.

[Jessie Drew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting enough to keep reading but not up my alley.