John Williams’ Stoner
Continuing with Anthony Jeselnik’s online book group, I just finished his May pick, Stoner by John Williams. This is the first Jeselnik selection I had some prior knowledge about, as I’d tried to read the book several years ago after finding it on a website discussing the little known gems of 20th century literature. John Williams was also a professor at Denver University, where I—almost—got my second masters degree (library science. It’s a long story, but I ended up getting it from the University of Illinois instead), so I was intrigued by the connection. As I recall, I only got about 15 pages into it before getting distracted by something, and I never picked it up again.
Starting back into it, I sort of remembered why I never picked it up again. The opening feels a bit tedious. In fact, I’d say the first quarter of the book are a bit of a slog, overburdened with exposition that never really allows the reader to get into the character of William Stoner. That’s an issue that comes back into play a few times in the novel. I’m not against exposition at all. Despite the hoary cliche of “Show, don’t tell,” the craft is called storytelling not storyshowing. And literary stories always seem to favor or accept exposition more than other genres, or so it seems to me.
That said, a writer does need to mix it up a little. Stoner becomes a brilliant novel once Williams eases back on just telling about his character and letting us enjoy his lived experience as a teacher confronting a failing marriage, campus politics, existential crisis and the tedium of living. Published in the 1960s, it felt like a much older novel to me, with echoes of William Dean Howells, Henry James and Edith Wharton. This was offset by jolting and welcome moments of sexual frankness decidedly of 1960s sensibilities. The overall mood of the novel is quiet, which give me a particular enjoyment. I’d much rather read a novel like The Remains of the Day or Gilead than the latest suspense or thriller tale, and Stoner’s overall narrative feels dedicated to verifying the famous Thoreau sentiment that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
There’s so much to appreciate and learn from in Stoner. I love how closely observed people are throughout the book. For example, during Stoner’s wedding:
He saw his mother and father standing in the same corner of the room, from which they had not moved. His mother was smiling, and his father had his hand awkwardly on her shoulder.
I can recognize my own parents in that brief, otherwise inconsequential detail, and Williams pulls off these little observations throughout the book, simultaneously telling and showing. Later in the book, we’re told of a small moment when another literature professor named Lomax—who becomes Stoner’s nemesis—kisses Stoner’s wife upon leaving a party. Lomax has a physical deformity, and later on champions a clearly inadequate student apparently because the student, too, has a disability. Once you’ve learned Lomax’s mindset, I think it recontextualizes the kiss and suggests that once again he’s finding someone who has a clear problem (mental illness or bipolar disorder, perhaps) and seeing a kindred spirit.
I could go on and on about this novel. I think it’s the best of Jeselnik’s choices yet. I’m also interested in all the various similarities and themes that seem to emerge from all of these books so far. This novel and The Dept of Speculation have failed/failing marriages and questions of life choices at their heart. Mother Night gave us a romanticized view of marriage while looking at amoral/immoral lengths someone will go to in pursuing their artistic goals—becoming a more literal version of the “art monster” that overshadows The Dept of Speculation. But of course, theme-hunting in books might as well be an exercise in pareidolia after awhile. You can see them all over the place and use them to create larger patterns of unification across different works. I still enjoy doing it.
