I might not have found Stoner save for an actor friend in NYC who wrote saying how moved he was by it. I read it and was equally rapt and immediately began urging friends to read it. I was an "academic," but Stoner is not an "academic novel." It suggested Steven Millhauser's Martin Dressler in its spareness and evocation (but without Millhauser's eerie "night vision.") If you like the call of a Hawthorne-like tale, read Stoner.
I might not have found Stoner save for an actor friend in NYC who wrote saying how moved he was by it. I read it and was equally rapt and immediately began urging friends to read it. I was an "academic," but Stoner is not an "academic novel." It suggested Steven Millhauser's Martin Dressler in its spareness and evocation (but without Millhauser's eerie "night vision.") If you like the call of a Hawthorne-like tale, read Stoner.