Stoner

Isn't life disappointing?

In Orson Welles' movie Citizen Kane, it opens up with a broad overview of the central main character Charles Foster Kane and the grandiose life that he lived - from birth to death, he lived in a mansion, with a life of notable achievements that has cemented his place in history. This entire sequence spoils all the events of the story, giving a broad overview of the events of a man we have yet to meet with only the knowledge that the “public” would already know. Yet, the movie soon jumps backwards in time - ready to give the same information again, but this time with tender nuance that now paints that information in a different light. What once seemed to be a great life, now becomes something that's lonely and pitiable once we truly see it for a second time. It's not the broad accomplishments in a man's life that defines his greatness - it is the tiny details that now turn his life into a tragedy.

John Williams' novel Stoner is perhaps the opposite of this - opening up describing William Stoner, a man who left no tangible mark on the world after his death and no notable accomplishments to remember him with, whose students did not hold him in high regard and who the faculty seldom spoke of. He never rose above the rank of assistant professor and wrote a singular book - perhaps forgotten by now by the many others, lost in the annals of time. Perhaps many would say his life was a failure - and perhaps many would ask, why is this our protagonist? He is not a man with a sad backstory that contrasts and humbles him, nor is he a man of great figure that we want to become. He is simply a man; a man who aspired for very little, but failed in the end; a man who stayed in one place his whole life until his death. There is very little distinguishing this man from any other man I would pass on a street and not give a second thought to. Perhaps, that is Stoner's greatest strength: it lies within the fact that it is a true reflection of life, without deluding itself into something grander, and not despairing itself into something less. Stoner is a love letter to an unremarkable, boring life - one that is as rich as any life can be.

Despite its dedication to reflecting life, it does not compromise its readability; is able to ride the fine line between verisimilitude and entertainment, somehow making the most mundane of events and observations feel almost like an epic. It achieves this through such excellent prose that does not beg to be looked at; it is bereft of fancy vocabulary and instead opts to make these sentences flow in such long sentences, with such natural rhythm. Beautiful in a way that is invisible - like a guiding hand that turns your head to see something you otherwise would have missed - and devastating in the way that there is a constant through line of tragedy that is never mentioned.

Despite tragedy striking, life simply goes on. Throughout Stoner, there is a sense of cautious optimism in the face of unplaced grief and melancholy. It is never unrelenting to the point it is overly depressing, but it is just real enough that it is never truly resolved. Just as it is in life, sometimes it is best to move on. It may not be fair or right, but it is just how the world is: a series of events, apathetic to how one might feel in the end. It captures so many of the tiny little hurts and disappointments of life, with the sparse moments of happiness that are perhaps fleeting. Never have I read a book that captures what it's like to be flirting with the idea of suicide that comes from mundanity or the realization of their replaceability without entering the realm of clinical depression. It is a pain that is relatable because it is a thought that enters everyone's minds. But it also makes the beauty in this book that more profound, juxtaposed with the quiet misery. Life is a balance of both - an entirely human experience, grounded in one man.

William Stoner is deceptively a simple character - one that may be passive and just a vessel to see through the world. He is instead a man of quiet resilience and stoicism that he becomes almost heroic in spite of tragedy. He has his faults and consistently makes mistakes that are of naivety or impulsivity, but above all he maintains his identity, never letting the world around him strip him of his identity and passions. He is a good man - full of love that is mishandled and thwarted - who lives in a world that is concerned with grander things. Equally fascinating is the troubled marriage between him and Edith - an unstated, passively crumbling nature that causes them both much strife. There is an unspoken tragedy of circumstance as to how it happens. Is it a relationship carried on by apathy and unstopped inertia? Or perhaps it is the many successful blows of unrequited actions that culminate in lost love? Many of the other characters are brought to life with so few words - each given an entire implicit backstory, full of depth that has yet to be explored. Even the antagonists feel so real - they are not evil, just people that do not like Stoner for relatable reasons. Just like life.

This is the kind of book that has to be read to be experienced - there is no way I could sell someone on the premise that this incredibly niche genre and setting could be something so profound where not much of note happens, but Stoner is beautiful, able to weave the words to make something that feels almost life-changing in how authentic it is. It is one of those times where I wish a book was longer; it is not often that I read a passage and scramble for a highlighter after re-reading it many times over just to make sure what I was reading was as great as I thought it was, only for it to be actually that good. It somehow makes the mundanity of life so thrilling - keeping me on the edge of my seat for petty disagreements- and so well paced that so many pages go by that I really didn't know how much time has passed. Even though it does not provide the answer as to what the true meaning of life is, it makes me appreciate what life could be.


My only gripe is that it uses the phrase “had had” and “that that” almost as if Williams goes out of his way to do so. >:(