Adam Foulds

Butcher’s Crossing is not at all like Stoner — but it’s just as superbly written

Another John Williams novel has been republished, this one set in the bleak and rugged American West

circa 1870: A wagon train of Rocky Mountain emigrants crossing the plains of America into Oregon to set up their homesteads in the West. (Photo by MPI/Getty Images) 
issue 18 January 2014

John Williams’s brilliant 1965 novel, Stoner, was republished last year by Vintage to just, if surprisingly widespread, acclaim and went on to sell tens of thousands of copies and appear in many Books of the Year lists. Written with a sober perfection of style that suits its subject — the elegantly factual glowing with a careful lyricism — Stoner depicts the life of a diligent Midwestern literary academic that is often one of quiet desperation but is periodically shot through with luminous moments of insight and love.

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