‘Stoner’ portrays intensity of relationships in university life
The remarkable theme of this novel is the pure love of teaching, particularly of medieval literature, which shines throughout it on the part of the character Stoner, as well, I suspect, as on the author’s part.
Stoner, born at the end of the 19th century, was living with his parents on a dirt-poor Missouri farm until his parents sent him to the university to study agronomy in anticipation of his taking over that farm.
As he studies, working at a nearby farm, he realizes it is English literature, not agronomy, that must be his life work, and he must disappoint his father. He graduates in 1914, and stays on at the university for the necessary degrees to become a professor there – all the while living and working on the farm.
English literature “troubled and disquieted him in a way nothing had ever done before.”
He was not a distnguished teacher of English literature, just a devoted one. Thus begins his next 30 years at the university, with its many levels of politics and intrigues.
Meanwhile, he falls in love with a beautiful banker’s daughter living with her family. She consents to marry him, though until she wants a child, she will not participate in sexual activity with him. And then she turns his daughter against him, hypocritically telling her “now your father has so much work – come away.”
To offset that relationship, Stoner finds a young teacher and with her, all the love so absent in his marriage. He has one enemy at the university and that man threatens to fire the girl Stoner loves, and she disappears.
University life is intense in its relationships, and Stoner has his share of friends and enemies – sharply drawn, some morally reprehensible. The politics at the university makes for very interesting and enlightening narrative, including a fair share of suspense.
The writing is remarkable; the characters sharp and vivid; the dialogue revealing; and principles of university life embodied in Stoner himself.
Author John Williams won the 1973 National Book Award for his novel Augustus.
Book info:
Stoner
By John Williams
New York Review of Books Classics, $14.95
Posted by Rae Eastman
on April 4, 2013. Filed under Arts and Entertainment,Book Reviews,Columns,Opinion.
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