Stoner in Never too Late to Read Classics

Jan 01, 2020 Sara rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, borrowed-from-library, literary-fiction, american, more-than-5-stars

But William Stoner knew of the world in a way that few of his younger colleagues could understand. Deep in him, beneath his memory, was the knowledge of hardship and hunger and endurance and pain. Though he seldom thought of his early years on the Booneville farm, there was always near his consciousness the blood knowledge of his inheritance, given him by forefathers whose lives were obscure and hard and stoical and whose common ethic was to present to an oppressive world faces that were express But William Stoner knew of the world in a way that few of his younger colleagues could understand. Deep in him, beneath his memory, was the knowledge of hardship and hunger and endurance and pain. Though he seldom thought of his early years on the Booneville farm, there was always near his consciousness the blood knowledge of his inheritance, given him by forefathers whose lives were obscure and hard and stoical and whose common ethic was to present to an oppressive world faces that were expressionless and hard and bleak.

William Stoner leaves the hardship of the farm behind for the often ruthless and bitter world of academia, driven by his love for literature and his passion for knowledge. His stoic isolation is heartrending. He is, I believe, Everyman: the ordinary person who encounters more obstacles than helping hands in life, but who gets glimpses of what might have been, should have been, if life were fair or if we could know our path before we take it.

It would be easy to dismiss Stoner as a failure. He has no success in his marriage or his professional life, he does nothing remarkable or lasting. And yet, I did not put down this novel thinking about how he had failed externally, but rather where he had succeeded internally; how he had held on to his sense of self and his love for both one woman, knowledge and literature and refused to be beaten by the constant barrage by those who wished to utterly destroy him.

“Lust and learning,” Katherine once said. “That’s really all there is, isn’t it?”

Perhaps she is right, but I think you could add love and self-respect to the list and you would have a picture of Stoner and the man that he is.

This book is a slow-paced revelation and it contains one of the sweetest love scenes I have ever read. It was so poignant that it brought literal tears to my eyes. It was very subtle, but stirred my emotions, for it was a description not of sex, but of love. It struck me that Stoner is a man who loves for real. He loves his few friends, literature, his daughter, and one woman--and he loves them unconditionally and unceasingly.

This is, at its core, a book about opposites and antagonisms; about love and hate, youth and old age, success and failure, hope and hopelessness. Are we what others see and decide we are, or what we perceive ourselves to be? The surface or the depth? I think we do not look at Stoner with disdain because he is so genuine beneath his skin. He is not the man his colleagues, students, or wife believe him to be, he is the man he believes himself to be and he refuses to be defined by others. Perhaps we cry for him because we admire him. He never gets a break, it seems, but he does not whine, he soldiers on. He stands for something, even when the cost is high.

If you don’t know this novel, you should; if it is sitting on your shelf, I assure you you are passing over the gold to get to the tin. Read it because it is not a book about one man, it is a book about all of us.
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Mar 29, 2019 John rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: classics-book-club

Just as brilliant and moving on the second read.

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Jan 22, 2024 Wave rated it it was amazing

Chapter 14....what a great chapter 13. He and Katherine just spent their time, their short time in perfect time. They didn't say goodbye, no words--perfectly explained.

Why stay with someone that despises you? Such evil...Edith...why? ...more

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