To the Lighthouse

Rating:
Summary: Capturing the elusive nature of thought......
Review: To the Lighthouse is a dazzling work of art that illustrates with great clarity the dynamic nature of human thought and perception. "How can an artist do that?", one might reasonably ask. Well,if that artist is Virginia Woolf, the answer is, "With unmistakeable genius". While Woolf's influence is seen everywhere in works of literature that would follow, one must keep in mind that the literary technique employed for most of the novel, stream of consciousness, was still very radical and experimental at the time it was written. Woolf's portrait of the thoughts that pass through the minds of family members and their houseguests at the seaside and her harnessing and transformation of the essence of time and into words is nothing short of awe-inspiring. That she also manages to tell a story and develop rich characters that the reader cares about while painting these portraits of thought and time is utterly amazing. Then, there are her words which connect it all; beautiful words that flow like the sea and color like a paintbrush. It is no accident that one of the main characters, Lily, is a painter, who with her strokes of the brush intermingling with her thoughts, tells this story.
Although considered a modernist, as was James Joyce (who also employed stream of consciousness in his works), I found this novel more accessible than Ulysses. It was as if Woolf wanted to create a work that would touch as many people as possible, while Joyce had developed a private code that only a select few could crack. While (trying) to read Ulysses I felt intimidated, left behind; while immersed in To the Lighthouse, I felt invited and included. For a taste of modernist literature at it's most inviting and poetic, I recommend To the Lighthouse!

Rating:
Summary: ONE OF THE BEST NOVELS OF THE 20th CENTURY
Review: absolutely stunning literature, i've read some great books, by some great authors (nabokov, proust, fitzgerald, hemingway, dickens, faulkner, dreiser, thoreau, joyce) and this is definetly a standout among the pack. it definetly deserves its place in the canon and a place on your "read books rack" if you are any kind of serious literati or academic. It probes deeply human and profound topics; man's relation to nature and time, the meaning of life, gender issues, relationships. And most of all it is absolutly beautiful prose. the second section, time passes, is probably the most beautiful literature i have ever had the pleasure of. pick this one up!

Rating:
Summary: Bold experiment, yes - timeless classic, no
Review: To The Lighthouse was an ambitious, brave experiment in literature, a bold venture into stream-of-consciousness techniques and profound themes relating to the fundamental differences between the sexes. It deserves to be recognized as an important contribution to 20th century fiction. Alas, that does not mean that it deserves to be read. It was far too tedious, and relied to a great extent on style and literary technique to drive it forward. And while I rarely go searching for "an easy read," nor do I seek out plot-driven novels, this book was simply too far towards the opposite extremes to be enjoyable.

The most highly regarded of Virginia Woolf's many books, To The Lighthouse focuses on the Ramseys, a British family in the 1910s and their interactions with family friends at their vacation home in Scotland. I wish I could say more about the plot, but frankly, not much happens. Oh, sorry, they keep talking about sailing out to the Lighthouse (and eventually they do, even). But this book is not about plot. It is about the emotional and philosophical ruminations of Woolf's characters, none of whom is particularly sympathetic or engrossing. Woolf juxtaposes the rational, abrasive Mr. Ramsay with the pleasant, introspective Mrs. Ramsay in an attempt to make profound statements about the differences between men and women. Woven into this central issue are the themes of love and art. Perhaps this book was revolutionary when it was first written, but can it appropriately be considered timeless? Given its limited appeal to even the most avid, intelligent readers of today, I think the answer is 'no.'

Rating:
Summary: Too jumpy for me
Review: First of all, this was my first experience in reading a stream of consciousness book. When I first began reading it, I thought I would enjoy it more than I did. Since I only read it in my spare time, which would sometimes only be fifteen minutes, I did not pay as much attention to the small details as I should have. It became difficult for me to follow each character because my own mind wondered off as the pages turned. Generally, I enjoy books that are suspenseful or have a fast-paced storyline, so this was simply not the style of book for me. Do not read this book if you are looking for an exciting plot or simply do not have the time to put into reading this short novel.

There were many reasons why I did not enjoy reading this classic. First of all, I disliked the author's complex, third person omniscient shifting of perspectives through the various characters in the tale. The book focuses more on the summer home in the Hebrides than on the actual characters themselves. Only the character's inner thoughts are written about and there are very few physical descriptions of them. The story is more about the inner workings and complexities of the small group of people than the lighthouse (or going there). Narrative voice is shared between characters as narration becomes thought and smoothly passes from character to character, anticipating the stream of consciousness style. The themes are also very abstract and its plot structure becomes undefined at times.

To the Lighthouse is a quiet and meditative novel that deals with post World War I issues. Often, I felt as if Woolf could not hold a single thought or development long enough to
make me care about anything. Virginia Woolf did give glances to a few good story possibilities, but then she would move on to something else; thus, losing my interest and never truly
developing any character or situation. As soon as something intriguing was about to occur, the book would jump back to events that happened in the past chapters.

I have read books that I enjoyed less than To the Lighthouse, so I do not consider it to be a horrible piece of literature. If you like to read stories that jump and skip from place to place, then maybe this novel is for you. I felt this novel could have adequately been told as a short story with its only lost being its monotone and dull nature. I had to struggle to complete this book, so maybe the meaning was just lost on me. I kept reading to see if there was some literary genius buried within, but unfortunately I never found it.

Rating:
Summary: Very interesting, but not an easy read
Review: If you are looking for a book to read in the bath or on vacation at the beach, don't get this book. If you have the time and patience to study a serious work of art, then this might be just the book for you.

I have to say that it took a lecture from one of my college professors at UNC-Chapel Hill to get me to like this book. Until I fully understood the unique style Woolf uses to write this novel, I didn't appreciate it fully.

If you take your time with this book (and you don't let yourself get frustrated), then you might fall in love with it as I have.

Rating:
Summary: awful
Review: Okay, I read a bunch of criticism to figure out why this book is on the list,
never mind why it's so high on the list. As one would expect, the critics are
awash in psychoblither. But there's one thing I didn't see, and it's the
obvious one, Virginia Woolf was consumed by (...)envy. What the hell else
could the title of the freakin' book mean?

Let's parse the phrase:

To: towards
the: the
Lighthouse: enormous erect phallus
I'm thinking you don't need a graduate degree to figure this one out.
A noxious blend of James Joyce, Sigmund Freud & feminism, it's all interior monologues & mini-epiphanies. No worthwhile human being could possibly live a productive life while having these banal, self-important soliloquies running through his head--we'd still be in caves.

GRADE: F

Rating:
Summary: A unique novel that is worth reading
Review: Much has been made of the "stream-of-consciousness" style of Woolf's To the Lighthouse. Woolf did seek to catch the flow between a character's inner monolog and verbalized utterings. Since the first of the three parts of the novel all occurs in one evening, this serves to stretch time and really examine the events of that evening in miniscule detail. The novel has no real plot--it examines an event that did not occur and then finally did occur (the trip to the lighthouse) as symbolism for the life, death and hopes of the main characters: Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey, James, their son, and Lily Briscoe, an artist visiting them on their summer house on the Isle of Skye.

Mrs. Ramsey is a Junonian figure, motherly, nurturing and a contrast to her rigid, somewhat cruel, and totally intellectual husband, a philosopher. Mrs. Ramsey represents Nature (frequently, flower-like terms are used to describer her.) Like a flower, Mrs. Ramsey blooms, is fruitful with eight children and then fades away. Mrs. Ramsey's death is shocking, more so because it, like the other deaths, occurs only in brief aside remarks. The flow of life continues unabated by these interruptions. Only Lily Briscoe must stop, now and then, to mourn Mrs. Ramsey even as she congratulates herself on narrowly escaping the life of a married woman, a life that Mrs. Ramsey (who believed all women MUST be married, again, a Juno-like trait) tried to arrange for her.

If you read To the Lighthouse for the language rhythms and for the fantastic flow between character point-of-view, you will be blow away. If you need a novel with defined plot, this is not for you. The brilliance of To The Lighthouse is in its haunting symbolism.

Rating:
Summary: light spaces between us
Review: Stream of consciousness prose went in and out of style pretty fast, though some experimenters occasionally make use of it still no one used it to greater effect than Joyce and Woolf. Of course they had the advantage of using the style first and so it was new. In my opinion Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man was the best novel ever written in this style, but To the Lighthouse is the second best. Published in 1927 it deals with very large issues but in a very intimate setting. The Ramsay vacation home is visited every summer and every summer change and time itself makes its presence felt in varying ways on each of the consciousnesses that occuppy the house. The center consciousness is Mrs. Ramsay's whose quiet devotion to her family is compared to a freer kind of existence in the form of a female painter. Mrs. Ramsay is a kind of beacon to her family, she provides the safety and comfort that comes with order and ritual. Her husband is the head of the family and the one more connected to worldly awareness and concerns but her less obvious and less defineable role is really the one that allows all to function. But things happen that cannot be controlled. The war breaks the routine that had been established over the years and after the war things are no longer as they were, there is a desolate feel as post war life resumes because things that were once there no longer are. The interior monologues that capture each character in their moments of being support an overall view being that most of life is lived alone and to oneself and forces we cannot control really determine the demeanor of our days, our own decisions are important but in relation to the larger forces shaping them very small things. The books of the twenties are still the best. A quiet book that sends very deep and resonant waves through ones mind and body.

Rating:
Summary: "Matches struck unexpectedly in the dark"
Review: Of all the books that have worn well over the years, this is one of my favorites.
For me, its essence lies in Lily Briscoe's musings near the end of the novel: "The great revelation had never come. Perhaps the great revelation never did come. Instead there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark... In the midst of chaos there was shape; this eternal passing and flowing (she looked at the clouds going and the leaves shaking) was struck into stability. Life stand still here, Mrs. Ramsey said... She owed it all to her."

Add to this a few lines from T.S. Eliot's "Four Quartets" (another favorite of mine):"The moments of happiness - not the sense of well-being / Fruition, fulfilment, security or affection / Or even a very good dinner, but the sudden illumination / We had the experience but missed the meaning / And approach to the meaning restores the experience / In a different form, beyond any meaning / We can assign to happiness. (....)"

Rating:
Summary: It improves every time I read it
Review: I must have read this novel at least five or six times, and every time I return to it I re-discover its greatness; I also discover things I haven't noticed before. I've read it on my own, and for class assignments, and for writing major papers about it, and it remains, for me, the best book written in the twentieth century. It's not about plot (it doesn't really have much of it), nor about any one specific topic or theme - it is about human relationships, and how, even in a small grouping of people, these relationships assume a depth that is above and beyond the pettiness of their actual concerns. It is, however, a rather difficult book to read, especially if you're expecting a plot-driven story, and requires patience. As you can obviously understand by my words so far, however, it is more than worth it.