Review of Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse

Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse

As many of you probably know, Virginia Woolf is a master of description as well as a wordy and long-winded English writer. To the Lighthouse in particular, is easy to read mostly because of the skills she has in writing prose, but I suggest reading it in a couple of sittings rather than throughout a few weeks like I did.

For half of the book, the story focuses on a single day on the Isle of Skye and it explores the family dynamics of the Ramseys and their many children. Each child and Mrs. Ramsey beg to visit the lighthouse near the island but Mr. Ramsey firmly objects. Because of the story's slow pace, it is easy to forget Mrs. Ramsey’s (the protagonist) 6 children and the many specific characteristics delineated, simply and unconsciously by getting distracted by the smooth POV shifts. This is even harder when Woolf 's quick mind needs the reader to keep up with an almost stream of consciousness style that often skips perspectives, and has close to no dialogue. While some of the characters are easily distinguishable, such as Lily who loves to paint or Mr. Ramsey's love of knowledge, others like Prue or Jasper are not as developed. This book is not one whose purpose is driven by the many characters but it is rather driven by time and the implication that everything falls apart.

The second half of the book is as beautiful as an Albert Bierstadt painting and zooms in farther than before on the changes of the Ramsey's house and the distance that emerges among children and father, as repercussions of multiple family deaths.

As wonderful and enchanting her writing is, I must say it is a rather uneventful book, so if you’re looking for a strong plot, this might not be the book for you. If you like images of nature, the idea of how time passes and that life can move on without you, this could be for you. Although it is a 300 page book, I think it would make a great short movie.