Previous
Doctors
One of the sections of Doris’ Betty Crocker cookbook that has the greatest impact on Marilyn is entitled “Basic Eggs.” It instructs housewives to know all six “basic ways” to make an egg and to learn their husband’s preferred style. Despite Marilyn’s resistance to this whole concept, she does make eggs for each member of her family in their favorite style: “Sunny-side up for James. Hard-boiled for Nath. Scrambled for Lydia.” Eggs thus represent the thoughtful and often painstaking work that goes into being a wife and mother—work that Marilyn comes to resent as pointless and banal. When Marilyn “disappears” to Toldeo, Nath is heartbroken that there is no one around to make him a hard-boiled egg, as this represents to him the care and stability that he craves. Indeed, eggs are a common symbol of reproduction, the family, and the future. In being so dismissive of the work of making eggs, perhaps Marilyn undervalues the importance of caring for her family (even if this work is less conventionally glamorous or impressive than being a doctor).
Eggs Quotes in Everything I Never Told You
The Everything I Never Told You quotes below all refer to the symbol of Eggs. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 6
Quotes
NaOH became Nath, his small face wide-eyed and reproachful. One morning, consulting the periodic table, instead of helium she thought He and James's face floated up in her mind. Other days, the messages were more subtle: a typo in the textbook––"the common acids, egg. nitric, acetic . . ."—left her in tears, thinking of hard-boiled, sunnyside up, scrambled.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
She followed him all the way to the lake and to the end of the little pier. The houses on the other side of the water looked like dollhouses, tiny and scaled-down and perfect. Inside, mothers were boiling eggs or baking cakes or making pot roasts, or maybe fathers were poking the coals in the barbecue,
turning the hot dogs with a fork so that the grill made perfect black lines all over. Those mothers had never gone far away and left their children behind. Those fathers had never slapped their children or kicked over the television or laughed at them.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Everything I Never Told You LitChart as a printable PDF.
Eggs Symbol Timeline in Everything I Never Told You
The timeline below shows where the symbol Eggs appears in Everything I Never Told You. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 4
...through cooking. The book argues that all wives should know their husband’s preferred style of egg and that there is no “deeper sense of satisfaction” than having an organized, well-stocked kitchen....
(full context)
...of her own life and how it is “possible to spend so many hours cooking eggs,” each family member getting them in their favorite style. Marilyn steps out into the rain...
(full context)
Back in Middlewood, James is unable to cook eggs properly for the children, who constantly ask when Marilyn is coming home. James takes Nath...
(full context)
...any mention of the racist language. Nath, meanwhile, furiously asks his mother for a hard-boiled egg, which causes her to burst into tears. Marilyn remains in a terrible mood all day...
(full context)
Chapter 6
...sigh,” thinking that his mother’s reappearance will mean the return of lavish dinners and hard-boiled eggs for breakfast.
(full context)
...care about his interest in outer space. That morning, he’d asked Marilyn for a hard-boiled egg, and to his delight she’d said yes; however, as soon as Lydia came down and...
(full context)
...welcome-back picnic at the beginning of the school year, Nath and James enter the father-son egg race. They are in first place until Nath trips and breaks his egg before the...
(full context)
Chapter 8
...eat. James barks at his son for wasting power; Nath, who is holding a hard-boiled egg in his hand, apologizes. James is suddenly aware that he smells of Louisa’s perfume, and...
(full context)
...late. Nath punches the countertop and runs out of the kitchen. James notices a smashed egg lying on the counter. In the morning, James sees it is July 3rd; this used...
(full context)
