Summer Book Club: The Triumph of the Egg [Part 2 of 3]

The Triumph of the Egg is another cycle of short stories by Sherwood Anderson that forms a natural progression from his original collection, Winesburg, Ohio.  Like his previous collection, this one too is set in the small town world of America's Midwest, but here the stories probe more deeply in the psyche and motivations of its characters, wherein the author employs an impressionistic touch expressing autumnal moods.  Literary naturalism plays an important role in its exploration of primitive impulses and the need to escape stifling social environments. Homespun characters grapple with half-formed insights, caught between maturity and prolonged adolescence, and enter worlds of fading substance.

Discussion led by Dr. Kristin Distel, who co-edited a reissue of Sherwood Anderson’s The Triumph of the Egg, published by Hastings College Press in 2019.