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  <id>166997</id>
  <title><![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]></title>
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  <description><![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]></description>
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        <name><![CDATA[John Edward Williams]]></name>
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    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
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    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>7</votes>
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  <read_at>Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007</read_at>
  <date_added>Mon Aug 27 13:31:42 -0700 2007</date_added>
  <date_updated>Thu Aug 30 10:48:07 -0700 2007</date_updated>
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    <body><![CDATA[Devastating novel of academia, unfulfilled hope, and a life not-entirely-lived. Gorgeous writing, heartbreaking plot, and if you're a fan, as I tend to be, of stories set in the dark halls of libraries and universities, this is one to read. The love story within this book is suddenly out-of-nowhere ...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5184902">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5184902]]></url>
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      <review>
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    <name><![CDATA[S.]]></name>
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    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
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    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>5</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
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  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Thu Jun 12 00:00:00 -0700 2008</read_at>
  <date_added>Tue May 06 11:11:22 -0700 2008</date_added>
  <date_updated>Thu Jun 12 01:21:22 -0700 2008</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[I didn't find this as sad or sorrowful as it’s often said to be. For me it’s about how the inner life redeems the outer, how a satisfying life of the mind makes the rest of life bearable. In that way, despite all the protagonist’s misfortune, I found Stoner an affirmative and even uplifting bo...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/21709472">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/21709472]]></url>
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</review>
      <review>
  <id>50377246</id>
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    <id>663291</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Scot]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[San Jose, CA]]></location>
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  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>4</votes>
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  <read_at>Tue Mar 31 00:00:00 -0700 2009</read_at>
  <date_added>Tue Mar 24 23:12:20 -0700 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Tue Mar 31 16:25:00 -0700 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[One of my sisters shared an earlier review I wrote here with one of her friends at work, an avid reader, and my sister reported back that her friend said I really needed to read <em>Stoner</em>.  In my ignorance, I had never heard of such a work of literature that I could recall, and initially suspected it m...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50377246">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50377246]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50377246]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>2564010</id>
    <user>
    <id>62656</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Bryant]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[London, The United Kingdom]]></location>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>3</votes>
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  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
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  <read_at>Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007</read_at>
  <date_added>Sat Jun 30 09:41:04 -0700 2007</date_added>
  <date_updated>Wed Dec 16 23:12:40 -0800 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[John Williams (not the composer) wrote this in 1965, and it has floated gently over the waters of high criticism in the four decades since.  I say gently because the book's gorgeously harnessed tone and style match its contained popularity.  Few know of it, but those who know it love it.  <br/><br/>...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2564010">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2564010]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2564010]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>26726744</id>
    <user>
    <id>419912</id>
    <name><![CDATA[David]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[Astoria, NY]]></location>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>3</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
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      </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[misfits, English majors]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Mon Jul 21 00:00:00 -0700 2008</read_at>
  <date_added>Tue Jul 08 23:23:16 -0700 2008</date_added>
  <date_updated>Mon Jul 21 19:02:54 -0700 2008</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[This is one of those books that I (pardon the cliche) did not want to end.  It also is one of those books that forces you look back over all the other books you've rated with 5 stars and consider dropping them a notch.  <br/><br/>This is a book about a man named William Stoner.  It covers his entr...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/26726744">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/26726744]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/26726744]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>8358035</id>
    <user>
    <id>90786</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Lee]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[Philadelphia, PA]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/90786-lee]]></link>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>3</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
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        <shelf name="read" />
          </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Fri Nov 14 00:00:00 -0800 2008</read_at>
  <date_added>Sun Oct 28 14:48:26 -0700 2007</date_added>
  <date_updated>Sat Nov 15 07:07:55 -0800 2008</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[Thanks to the goodreaders (Matthew and Katie, particularly) who suggested this one. The ideal midpoint on the stylistic continuum. Blurbs talk of its &quot;perfect novel&quot;-ness, and somehow, amazingly, that's what I was thinking while reading: maybe the perfect traditional tone (attentive, stead...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8358035">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8358035]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8358035]]></link>
</review>
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  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>2</votes>
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        <shelf name="read" />
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  <read_at></read_at>
  <date_added>Thu Jul 17 04:02:44 -0700 2008</date_added>
  <date_updated>Thu Jul 24 20:19:14 -0700 2008</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[fantastic book. steve almond suggested this. it reminds me very much of D.H.'s &quot;Sons and Lovers&quot; and the reason being is that the prose is superb--beautiful! It's a straight forward story about a student-turned professor. it has nothing to do with getting stoned. there's a heart-wrenching ...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/27502430">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/27502430]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/27502430]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>47927615</id>
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    <name><![CDATA[Shya]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[Brooklyn, NY]]></location>
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  <isbn>1590171993</isbn>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
  </title>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>4</rating>
  <votes>2</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
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  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at></read_at>
  <date_added>Sun Mar 01 15:51:18 -0800 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Sun Mar 01 15:51:42 -0800 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[In some ways, it’s much easier to speak about what Stoner doesn’t do than what it does.  It doesn’t have acrobatic language.  It doesn’t have complex structure.  It doesn’t have any real narrative drive or plot.  It doesn’t have a particularly heroic or otherwise inherently interesting m...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/47927615">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/47927615]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/47927615]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>50789288</id>
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    <id>2171826</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Tyler]]></name>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
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  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>1</votes>
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          </shelves>
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  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Thu Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2006</read_at>
  <date_added>Sun Mar 29 05:36:48 -0700 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Sun Mar 29 05:41:21 -0700 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[Stoner is a simple book, as many great books are.<br/><br/>The story is the life of William Stoner, the son of poor farm folk. Sent to university to study agriculture,  Stoner discovers his calling as a teacher of English literature. Told in prose that is as plain, honest and powerful as the chara...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50789288">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50789288]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/50789288]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>48998730</id>
    <user>
    <id>1457001</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Stephen]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[The United States]]></location>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>2</votes>
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          </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at></read_at>
  <date_added>Wed Mar 11 21:21:44 -0700 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Wed Mar 11 22:02:20 -0700 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[I have a colleague who is convinced that the single biggest problem at the University of Oregon is grade inflation.  No one, so far as I know, has listed John Williams' &quot;Stoner&quot; among the great novels of the twentieth century, so is my five-star rating just an indication that I too have be...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/48998730">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/48998730]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/48998730]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>2336924</id>
    <user>
    <id>83729</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Dan]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[The United States]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/83729-dan-rivas]]></link>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
  </title>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>0</rating>
  <votes>2</votes>
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  <read_at></read_at>
  <date_added>Sun Jun 24 16:52:07 -0700 2007</date_added>
  <date_updated>Wed Dec 16 22:34:55 -0800 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[Supposedly a very sobering novel. However, rumor is, if you light it on fire you will get high.]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2336924]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2336924]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>46863340</id>
    <user>
    <id>202831</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Kate]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[Portland, ME]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/202831-kate]]></link>
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    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>4</rating>
  <votes>1</votes>
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        <shelf name="read" />
          </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
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  <read_at></read_at>
  <date_added>Thu Feb 19 09:23:03 -0800 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Thu Feb 19 09:57:44 -0800 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[I read this because someone told me about it, because it's set in Missouri, on the University of Missouri's campus, and because it's a nyrb classic, the irresistible imprint (is it the pretty colors, the fine fonts, or the nyrb stamp of approval?).  A campus novel ;  a boy from the country gets an e...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46863340">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46863340]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/46863340]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>44381351</id>
    <user>
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    <name><![CDATA[James]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[Chicago, IL]]></location>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>1</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
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      </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Sat Nov 14 00:00:00 -0800 2009</read_at>
  <date_added>Mon Jan 26 06:15:31 -0800 2009</date_added>
  <date_updated>Mon Aug 24 06:45:39 -0700 2009</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[John Williams's Stoner is that rare novel which is almost perfect in every way, from its plain prose style to its subtle portrayal of themes and evocative descriptions of events that are common enough for all adults to have experienced them in ways that make the narration a pleasure - one which make...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/44381351">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/44381351]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/44381351]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>7639122</id>
    <user>
    <id>170563</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Sarah]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[New York, NY]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/170563-sarah]]></link>
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    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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  <average_rating>4.40</average_rating>
  <ratings_count>528</ratings_count>
  <description>
    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
  </description>
  <published>1973</published>
</book>

    <rating>5</rating>
  <votes>2</votes>
  <spoiler_flag>false</spoiler_flag>
  <shelves>
        <shelf name="read" />
          </shelves>
  <recommended_for><![CDATA[anyone with a pulse]]></recommended_for>
  <recommended_by><![CDATA[]]></recommended_by>
  <read_at>Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007</read_at>
  <date_added>Fri Oct 12 14:19:03 -0700 2007</date_added>
  <date_updated>Wed Apr 02 19:57:15 -0700 2008</date_updated>
  <read_count></read_count>
    <body><![CDATA[A new favorite. Nothing to do with drugs, but all to do with William Stoner, a would-be American farmer turned mid-Western English professor. Good old-fashioned psychological portrait, dealing with all the messy stuff that makes life bearable, and unbearable, in the vein of Dreiser, or Sinclair Lewi...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7639122">more...</a>]]></body>
    
  <url><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7639122]]></url>
  <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7639122]]></link>
</review>
      <review>
  <id>78160401</id>
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    <id>77353</id>
    <name><![CDATA[Lewis]]></name>
    <location><![CDATA[The United States]]></location>
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/77353-lewis-manalo]]></link>
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  <title>
    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[The story of a stoic farm boy who becomes a stoic academic, STONER is an extremely enjoyable yet deeply flawed work.  I would not have read this book had dozens and dozens of people not told me how great a novel it was and how much they loved it, and in many ways, STONER is masterful.  <br/><br/>Wil...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78160401">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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    <![CDATA[Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)]]>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[This is the most straight-forward linear narrative type of novel I've read in the past year.  So at first, I was not impressed.  But I soon realized that the novel is impressive precisely because it is able to be so damn linear, the writing style so damn plain, and the characters so damn dull and ye...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73562775">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[I came across this book by chance when I heard that John McGahern had written an introduction. Prior to John's passing in 2006 he wrote an article in the Observer about this book. Apparently he had been proselytizing the greatness of &quot;Stoner&quot; for some years and I had to investigate. I had ...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/70725324">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet a...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/63865122">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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      <review>
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[One of the great American novels of the twentieth century. Williams' quiet, spare prose about the life of an unremarkable man who teaches English at a university does not seem to be the stuff of great novels. I tried explaining the storyline to a friend of mine, who scoffed at my description - not f...<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/76101073">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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    <![CDATA[William Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments: marriage into a “proper” family estranges him from his parents; his career is stymied; his wife and daughter turn coldly away from him; a transforming experience of new love ends under threat of scandal. Driven ever deeper within himself, Stoner rediscovers the stoic silence of his forebears and confronts an essential solitude.<br/><br/>   John Williams’s luminous and deeply moving novel is a work of quiet perfection. William Stoner emerges from it not only as an archetypal American, but as an unlikely existential hero, standing, like a figure in a painting by Edward Hopper, in stark relief against an unforgiving world.]]>
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    <body><![CDATA[<p>Ever browse a bookstore and come across a book being marketed as a classic -- except that you've never heard of it? That, for me, is <em>Stoner</em>, by John Williams. Stoner is the last name of the main character, whose life we follow from the time he leaves his small farm household as a youth to attend col...</p><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/68192875">more...</a>]]></body>
    
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