2022 Reprint of the 1926 Edition. The Torrents of Spring is a novella written by Ernest Hemingway and first published in 1926. It is Hemingway's first long work and was written as a parody of Sherwood Anderson's Dark Laughter. It was written as an elaborate parody of Anderson in particular and the Chicago School of Literature in general. Mixed reaction greeted the novella upon publication as it was itself sharply critical of other important writers of the era. The work is generally dismissed by critics and seen as vastly less important than The Sun Also Rises, which was published in the same year. Hadley Richardson, Hemingway's wife at the time, believed his characterization of Anderson was "nasty", while John Dos Passos considered it funny but did not want to see it published. F. Scott Fitzgerald, on the other hand, considered the novella a masterpiece. Little scholarly criticism has been devoted to The Torrents of Spring, as it is considered less important than Hemingway's subsequent work. American readers would have recognized "a Great Race" in the subtitle as alluding to Madison Grant's The Passing of the Great Race, an eugenic history and argument for the superiority of Nordic blood, influential in the USA and Germany when first published (1916.) Contents: Part One. Red and black laughter -- Part Two. The struggle for life -- Part Three. Men in war and the death of society -- Part Four. The passing of a great race and the making and marring of Americans -- Author's final note to the reader.
