Her works are known for its melancholic atmosphere, Virginia Woolf, a female British author was born on January 25, 1882. Born into a family that is quite famous in the literature field, Woof's father, Leslie Stephen was the first editor of the Dictionary of National Biography. Her mother was famous for her looks and status in British society at that time. Coming from an art family, Woolf has 7 siblings and one of them is Vanessa who is a painter. She began her writing career as an anonymous reviewer in the Times Literary Supplement magazine while experimenting with her first work called Melymbrosia or The Voyage Out.
In the early 1920s, Woolf and her Bloomsbury friends started a writing club called The Memoir Club. Most of Woolf's works are inspired by real events in her life, and one of those works is To the Lighthouse. In this novel, Virginia tells the story of the Ramsay family who occasionally visits an island in Scotland every summer. According to her sister, this novel perfectly describes the childhood of Stephen's family, -Woolf’s family- especially their mother. Woolf's works are recognized as modern classical literature with its modernism theme. Through A Room of One's Own, Woolf discusses feminist issues and the women's movement, and this work is considered a classics-feminist literature. In addition, Virginia also wrote a novel entitled Orlando which describes her love affair with Vita Sackville-West. In 1941, her mental condition worsened, and Woolf decided to end her life in the Ouse river by drowning herself and leaving a letter for her husband, Leonard. To this day, Virginia's works are still remarkable and loved by many readers.
Synopsis
A big family, a house on Skye island, and a lighthouse.
To the Lighthouse tells the story of life through the Ramsay family on Skye island, which they visit every summer each year. This novel tells about simple things in the life of a family which we may find quite often. Mrs. Ramsay, the main subject of this story, is a woman who is elegant, beautiful, and loved by everyone. In contrast to his wife, Mr. Ramsay as the head of the family is a philosophy teacher who always demands validation from his family to cover his deficits. The Ramsays' guests are also unique; Lily Briscoe, a female painter who dared to transgress the patriarchal values of her time; Charles Tansley, a young man who argued that women can’t write nor paint; Minta Doyle, Mr. Carmichael, and many more. Everyone experiences life differently and this novel emphasizes that. To the Lighthouse describes the realities of life with descriptive and various feelings in every part; The Windows, Time Passes, and The Lighthouse.
“She felt... how life, from being made up of little separate incidents which one lived one by one, became curled and whole like a wave which bore one up with it and threw one down with it, there, with a dash on the beach.”
Virginia gives her 'new' point of view to the concept of time in this novel. In The Window, Woolf tells two days of the activities done by the Ramsay family, Woolf uses nearly 80 pages to describe it - including the dinner scene which almost takes up half of this first part. Then, in the second part, we will see how time goes on for 10 years in 10 chapters.
As part of a modernist novel, we will witness the activities through the characters’ minds. Unlike any other novel, To the Lighthouse has no literal plot in it. The majority of this book is about human entanglement to certain moments in life and also how we cope with grief. In her life, Woolf’s mental breakdown series started after her mother's death. It is also told in the book how the most precious member of the Ramsay family, Mrs. Ramsay, passed away and left an empty hole in the character's heart, more specifically Lily Briscoe. In the last part of this novel, Lily is trying to finish her paintings while remembering Mrs. Ramsay. In this series of thoughts, Lily kept asking existentialism questions such as the meaning of life.
As a fan of classical literature, I consider Woolf’s works unreachable to certain people, since she adapts the concept of consciousness. It's a little difficult for me to follow the direction of the conversation and what actually happened, because this stream of consciousness is like a ghost, it can change from one person to another without any sign. Moreover, Virginia's love of commas which could make a sentence into a paragraph long, made me feel a little dull reading it.
A lot argue that this book is one of her best works and captures the best concept of modernism , but having just read this one particular novel written by Woolf, I can’t give an objective review of her works. But indeed the influence this book gave is unarguable. With its existentialism and modernism theme, I quite enjoy the flow of where it goes. The one special lesson that I learned from To the Lighthouse is the little things that matter in life. How sometimes we often forget how our small simple gestures could be perpetual to someone’s life. Sometimes, when we’re searching for a grand answer to answer the ‘meaning of life’ we often forget how the small things and the people surrounding us are the ones that gave our life a meaning all along. Those things are the ones that gave value to our life.
This novel is a great novel for those who enjoys slow-plot and have a lot of spare time to perfectly catches the essence of it.
If you had read this book, let's discuss and share your thoughts below!
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