His early publications- Windy McPherson’s Son (1916), Marching Men (1917), and Mid-American Chants (1918)-were widely judged as flawed in style and execution, yet the publication of Winesburg, Ohio (1919) established Anderson’s reputation as a modern innovator in the short-story form. Although Anderson would later mythologize this episode as an artistic awakening that triggered his rejection of a corrupt business culture, he continued working as an advertising writer in Chicago for the next ten years while receiving literary advice from Floyd Dell, Margaret Anderson, and other figures associated with the Chicago Renaissance. However, over the next eight years, Anderson’s domestic and professional life became increasingly strained, leading eventually to what appears to have been a nervous breakdown in 1912. After military service during the Spanish-American War he completed his high-school education at Wittenberg Academy in Springfield, Ohio immediately thereafter he took an advertising job in Chicago in 1900, marrying his first wife, Cornelia Lane, in 1904. As a teenager in Clyde, Anderson’s reputation as a versatile worker led to his nickname “Jobby,” and he soon dropped out of high school to continue work in various local businesses.

Born in Camden, Ohio, Sherwood Anderson (b. 1876–d. 1941) was the son of a harnessmaker whose failing business led the family to resettle in Clyde, Ohio-the town that Anderson would later draw upon in writing Winesburg, Ohio.

Sherwood anderson book