The Triumph of The Egg by Sherwood Anderson American Dream Analysis Essay

In life, people strive for wealth, popularity, and “success,” holding on to values they think will bring them closer to happiness, only to realize that those materialistic standards brought them closer to misery than joy. “The Triumph of The Egg” by Sherwood Anderson is about a man who follows the American dream to later find out that it is intangible. The father is motivated by ambition and the egg in Sherwood Anderson’s writing is symbolic of what the American dream truly is. The American dream is the idea that in this country a person can become someone greater than themselves. That hard work and ambition will ultimately lead to the feeling of pleasure and fulfillment. The reality is that ambition alone does not bring satisfaction in one’s life; instead, it is personal aspirations that do. 

The narrator's parents are motivated by the desire to move up in society due to the pressure to attain the American dream. The father is heavily driven by the ambition to become “successful.” The father used to be joyous and content in his job as a farmhand until he became more determined: “At ten o’clock father drove home along a lonely country road, made his horse comfortable for the night and himself went to bed, quite happy in his position in life (...). They became ambitious. The American passion for getting up in the world took possession of them” (Anderson 230).  The father had been happy and pleased with his day-to-day routine, but due to societal influence, he feels the need to advance in life. There is no need to become higher up in society if one is already at ease with their lifestyle. Furthermore, this desire for the American dream makes the father heavy-hearted and greedy. In the father’s steps to transforming into the stereotypical, affluent American man he drove himself into utter despair, “Father became a little feverish in his anxiety to please. There was no doubt, lurking somewhere in him, a touch of the spirit of the showman”(Anderson236). His once joyful personality dwindled. Once the father became more ambitious, he started to feel that his life was never good enough, always wanting to become better, more admired, and wealthier. Ambition consumed him, stripping his cheerfulness away. The father neglected to realize that was the simple things in life that brought him contentment.   

In the Triumph of the Egg, the egg symbolizes the fragility and inconsistency of the American dream. After many failed attempts of trying to become famous by entertaining people with science experiments, the father started becoming impatient in his efforts: “He worked and worked and a spirit of desperate determination took possession of him. (...) The egg broke under his hand” (Anderson 239). The shell of an egg is perceived as durable and a protective covering, but in actuality, an egg is fragile and brittle. When relating the egg to the American dream, it represents just how unreliable it is. A misconception is that the American dream guarantees success, but really it just gives opportunities to achieve it. Like the egg, the American dream can break at any time. All that hard work could vanish because putting value into worldly things is never infinite; instead, people should focus their time on their own aspirations. 

It is personal dreams that bring people fulfillment in life, not ambition. In the poem, “Richard Cory” by Edwin Arlington Robinson, Richard Cory is well respected in society, popular, and well off, but there is a sad truth behind his life: “And he was rich—yes, richer than a king—(...) And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, Went home and put a bullet through his head” (Robinson, lines 9-16). The father in “The Triumph of the Egg,” works his whole life to be a man like Richard Cory, not knowing the sorrow Cory carries with him. Cory embodies what the American dream is, but is so miserable in his life that he kills himself. Sometimes I too find myself putting all my efforts into moving up in the world. I am always trying my hardest to get good grades so that I can become successful in the future. I put my worth in the percentage I get on a test or quiz. With time I have realized that in doing so I am not moving forward in my life but I am driving myself to a point of sorrow. The truth is that hard work does not always equal success, money, and popularity do not make up for authentic happiness, and lastly, the American dream is really not a dream at all, it is a nightmare.