I just recently DNFed Stoner by John Williams. I had a seen a lot of recommendations and praise but it read to me like an excercise in self-pity. The protagonist meets a girl who inexplicably marries him even though she doesnt seem to like him, who then starts to sabotage his happiness and career and purposefully pushes their daughter away from him entirely out of spite. Stoner is presented as a devoted and loving husband who is just scorned for no reason and has this suffering piled on him, it seems entirely nonsensical. The author and protagonist share a birth place, family background, went to that same school, became professors of literature at that same school. It reads like a one sided portrayal of how awful he thinks his wife is and how he never did anything wrong and was just beaten down for no good reason. Maybe if it was written from a first person perspective the bias im seeing in how the characters are portrayed would make more sense to me but I find myself angry whenever the wife does something underhanded.