Braddy Reads Winesburg, Ohio

Back in my college days, I took a class on the American Short Story, in which we read three excerpts from Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio. The stories made quite an impression on me, so I procured myself a copy... and didn't read it until just now.

Five years later.

Go me.

Anyway, I'm glad I went back to it. Winesburg, Ohio is one of the most rewarding books I've read this year, and it's one I imagine I'll come back to again.

Structurally, Winesburg, Ohio reminds me a lot of another American classic: Steinbeck's Pastures of Heaven. The book collects a series of stories that aren't STRICTLY connected but that take place in the same area and feature one or two recurring characters.

In Anderson's book, the main recurring character is a young man named George Willard, a bright young reporter just reaching the age of manhood. George features in nearly every story, so he's as close as the book gets to a main character. George struggles with understanding his own identity and what it means to bee a man (you could capitalize that "M," probably).

If I had to select a single, prominent theme that runs through all stories, based on my quick read of the text, I think "maturation" would probably be it. Admittedly, it's not a PERFECT fit with all the stories, but it seems to be the prominent issue: what exactly distinguishes a Man or Woman from a child? And, once you've crossed that point, what do you do about it?

That idea - about entering the world and being an "adult" - resonates pretty strongly with me, who still considers himself to be something of a child at the ripe old age of 27 or so. Like most great literature, Winesburg, Ohio doesn't answer the hard questions, but it makes you ask them.

(By the way, it appears that the whole book is available to read online. If nothing else, I recommend the story "Paper Pills," which has nothing to do with the maturity theme, but it's the story that got me interested enough to buy the whole book.)