The Egg (2009 short story)


"The Egg" is a short story by American writer Andy Weir, originally published on his website Galactanet on August 15, 2009. It is Weir's most popular short story, and has been translated into over 30 languages by readers.

Summary

The story is about the main character, who is "you", and God, who is "me". You, a 48-year-old man who dies in a car crash, meet the narrator, who says that you have been reincarnated many times before, and that you are next to be reincarnated as a Chinese peasant girl in 540 AD. God then explains that you are, in fact, constantly reincarnated across time, and that all human beings who have ever lived and will ever live are incarnations of you. You remark about being Abraham Lincoln, Adolf Hitler and Jesus, and God adds that you were also once John Wilkes Booth, every Holocaust victim and every person who followed Jesus. God explains that in fact there are other Godlike beings elsewhere, and that you too will one day become a God. The entire universe was created as an egg for the main character, and once you have lived every human life ever, you will be born as a God. The reason God created the universe was for the main character, you, to understand this point: "Every time you victimized someone...you were victimizing yourself. Every act of kindness you’ve done, you’ve done to yourself. Every happy and sad moment ever experienced by any human was, or will be, experienced by you."

In popular culture

The rapper Logic used The Egg as inspiration for his album Everybody released in 2017, re-imagined in the interlude track "Waiting Room" and featuring Neil DeGrasse Tyson as God.
In honor of the story's ten-year anniversary, the popular YouTube channel Kurzgesagt made an animation based on the story with Weir's permission, released on September 1, 2019.