The critical reception to Winesburg, Ohio upon its publication in 1919 was mostly positive,[93][94] even effusive. Hart Crane, for example, wrote that "...America should read this book on her knees,"[95] while H.L. Mencken wrote that Winesburg, Ohio "...embodies some of the most remarkable writing done in America in our time".[96] Despite criticism that Anderson's "sordid tales"[31] were humorless,[29] and "mired...in plotlessness",[93] Winesburg, Ohio was reprinted several times, selling a total of about 3,000 copies by 1921.[note 3]
The popularity of Winesburg, Ohio among readers and critics has remained fairly high but has fluctuated with Sherwood Anderson's literary reputation.[94] His reputation, while steady through the 1920s, began to decline in the 1930s.[97] William L. Phillips, following the lukewarm reception of The Letters of Sherwood Anderson in 1953, commented that "...Anderson is out of fashion."[98] Throughout that decade, however, the author and his most popular book were the subject of a "...re-examination, if only as a neglected literary ancestor of the moderns."[99] Into the 1960s and beyond, this "re-examination" became a "reevaluation"[99] by critics who today generally consider Winesburg, Ohio a modern classic.[94] Cleveland Review of Books reviewed the book after a new edition came out through Ohio University Press in 2019, calling it "a spotlight on the outcasts, of whom there are so many one may begin to wonder whether there exist any incasts."[100] The Pequod called it “one of the great modern short story collections… Anderson’s writing is of such consistently high quality that he is able to elevate the stories to the level of great poetry and even tragedy,” and rated the book a 9.5 (out of 10.0).[101] In a 2011 review, Ploughshares praised the book, and specifically highlighted its “in-depth, fearless, summarized description of emotion.”[102]
