Virginia Woolf

Susan Choi

To the Lighthouse

To the Lighthouse, considered by many to be Virginia Woolf's finest novel, is a remarkably original work, showing the thoughts and actions of the members of a family and their guests on two separate occasions, ten years apart. The setting is Mr and Mrs Ramsay's house on a Scottish island, where they traditionally take their summer holidays, overlooking a bay with a lighthouse. An experimental work that pushes the limits of what we know about the world and ourselves, Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse is one of the most beautifully crafted of all novels written in the English language. This Macmillan Collector’s Library edition features an afterword by Sam Gilpin. Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.

andrea valentina 

Porque en la agitación de la vida cotidiana, con todos aquellos hijos, todos aquellos huéspedes, se tenía constantemente una sensación de repetición, de una cosa cayendo donde ya había caído otra y produciendo por ello un eco que resonaba en el aire y lo llenaba de vibraciones.

Antes de cambiar la fluidez de la vida por la concentración de la pintura, Lily pasaba siempre (...) por unos instantes de desnudez en los que parecía un alma non nata, un alma separada del cuerpo, que se debatiera en alguna cumbre ventosa, expuesta sin protección al azote de todas las dudas.

...frente a lo transitorio, lo pasajero, lo espectral, como un rubí; de manera que de nuevo aquella noche tenía el sentimiento de paz, de descanso, que ya había experimentado anteriormente durante el día. Con momentos así, pensó, se construye la realidad que permanece para siempre. Esto permanecerá.

Francesca 

Always (it was in her nature, or in her sex, she did not know which) before she exchanged the fluidity of life for the concentration of painting she had a few moments of nakedness when she seemed like an unborn soul, a soul reft of body, hesitating on some windy pinnacle and exposed without protection to all the blasts of doubt. 

His immense self-pity, his demand for sympathy poured and spread itself in pools at her feet, and all she did, miserable sinner that she was, was to draw her skirts a little closer round her ankles, lest she should get wet. 

How then, she had asked herself, did one know one thing or another thing about people, sealed as they were? Only like a bee, drawn by some sweetness or sharpness in the air intangible to touch or taste, one haunted the dome-shaped hive, ranged the wastes of the air over the countries of the world alone, and then haunted the hives with their murmurs and their stirrings; the hives which were people.

A menudo le parecía no ser más que una esponja empapada al máximo en emociones humanas.

lelayna

Mrs. Ramsay sat silent. She was glad, Lily thought, to rest in silence, uncommnunicative; to rest in the extreme obscurity of human relationships. Who knows what we are, what we feel? Who knows even at the moment of intimacy, This is knowledge? Aren't things spoilt then, Mrs. Ramsay may have asked (it seemned to have happened so often, this silence by her side) by saying them? Aren't we more expressive thus? 

There it was before her-life. Life, she thought-but she did not finish her thought. She took a look at life, for she had a clear sense of it there, something real, something private, which she shared neither with her children nor with her husband. A sort of transaction went on between them, in which she was on one side, and life was on another, and she was always trying to get the better of it, as it was of her; and sometimes they parleyed (when she sat alone); there were, she remembered, great reconciliation scenes; but for the most part, oddly enough, she must admit that she felt this thing that she called life terrible, hostile, and quick to pounce on you if you gave it a chance.

It was love that never attempted to clutch it’s object; but, like the love mathematicians bear their symbols, or poets their phrases, was meant to be spread over the world and become part of the human gain. So it was indeed.

Directy one looked up and saw them, what she called "being in love” flooded them. They became part of that unreal but penetrating and exciting universe which is the world seen through the eyes of love. The sky stuck to them; the birds sang through them. And, what was even more exciting, she felt, too, as she saw Mr. Ranmsay bearing down and retreating, and Mrs. Ramsey sitting with James in the window and the cloud moving and the tree bending, 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 down with it, there, with a dash on the beach.

How then did it work out, all this? How did one judge people, think of them? How did one add up this and that and conclude that it was liking one felt, or disliking? And to those words, what meaning attached, after all? Standing now, apparently transfixed, by the pear tree, impressions poured in upon her of those two men, and to follow her thought was like following a voice which speaks too quickly to be taken down by one's pencil, and the voice was her own voice saying contradictory things, so that even the fissures and humps on the bark of the pear tree were irrevocably fixed there for eternity.

Strife, divisions, difference of opinion, prejudices twisted into the very fibre of being, oh, that they should begin so early.

It seemed to her such nonsense-inventing differences, when people, heaven knows, were different enough without that.

Alec Karlen

“D’you remember?” she felt inclined to ask him as she passed him, thinking again of Mrs. Ramsay on the beach; the cask bobbing up and down; and the pages fying. Why, after all these years had that survived, ringed round, lit up, visible to the last detail, with all before it blank and all after it blank, for miles and miles?

To pursue truth with such astonishing lack of consideration for other people's feelings, to rend the thin veils of civilisation so wantonly, so brutally, was to her so horrible an outrage of human decency that, without replying, dazed and blinded, she bent her head as if to let the pelt of jagged hail, the drench of dirty water, bespatter her unrebuked. There was nothing to be said.

because distant views seem to outlast by a million years (Lily thought) the gazer and to be communing already with a sky which beholds an earth entirely at rest.

To the lighthouse

Alina

The mutilated body (it was alive still) was thrown back into the sea.]

What is the meaning of life? That was all—a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years. The great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark; here was one.

But the stillness and the brightness of the day were as strange as the chaos and tumult of night, with the trees standing there, and the flowers standing there, looking before them, looking up, yet beholding nothing, eyeless, and so terrible.

Tija

 The war, people said, had revived their interest in poetry.

he stretched his arms out. They remained empty

 and this, and this, and this, she thought, 

 there is nothing more tedious, puerile and inhumane than love; yet it is also beautiful and necessary. 

fæ 

Set in the summer home of an English family, this novel unfolds through shifting perspectives of each character's stream of consciousness, recalling childhood emotions and highlights of adult relationships.

Maureen

“About here, she thought, dabbling her fingers in the water, a ship had sunk, and she muttered, dreamily half asleep, how we perished, each alone.”

***

Heralded as one of the best modernist texts, To the Lighthouse delves into the complexities of human emotion—particularly the dynamics of power among human relationships. On the surface, the novel centers around the Ramsey family and their plans to go to the lighthouse. Literally and metaphorically, however, the lighthouse remains elusive. By the end, only a few the members actually make the trip. In all truth, I failed to appreciate this novel in its entirety, as its modernist sentiment didn't really resonate with me. Nevertheless, Woolf’s mastery of the stream of consciousness is apparent, for she deftly inhabits a character's thought and shifts to another's in a heartbeat.

The relationship between Mr and Mrs. Ramsey is intriguing. The former is a cold-hearted philosopher, while the latter is the perennial homemaker. Although Mr. Ramsey doesn’t seem to show remorse whenever he belittles his wife’s capacities, he nevertheless openly demands her sympathy. For all his stoicism, he depends on her constant reassurance. On the other hand, Mrs. Ramsey cannot bring it upon herself to tell her husband the three words he so desperately wants to hear. Her love language was not words of affirmation but acts of service. The complexity of their relationship is best captured at the end of Part I, wherein Woolf assiduously discloses the thoughts of each. It is revealed that despite all their marital troubles and miscommunications, the love they have for each other is undeniable. 

Overall, I must confess that I had to force myself to finish this book, so it was not much of a pleasant read. It is, however, sprinkled with good quotes. Though some would declare that To the Lighthouse is Woolf’s greatest novel, I would much prefer Mrs Dalloway over this.

Sajiya Chaudhary

I bought this and A Room of One's Own together, when I was going through a very tough time. It felt like these two books would help me understand the difficulty that comes with being too anxious, an overthinker, someone who communicates with themselves excessively in their own head. And it took me three attempts to get going with this one. Every time I started, it felt difficult to understand what is going on here. Now being stuck at our homes, living our life in the same monotonicity, and having to talk to ourselves, this book made a lot of sense. It seemed less complex. Helped understand how complex human emotions, and how tangled human thoughts are, and the effects they can have on life their own and everyone around. Woolf has given some really beautiful metaphors in this one. I know I would require many more reads to get acquainted with the complexity here, but it was worth the many reads.

a compelling melody of the complexities of family dynamics, artistic unity, & the meaning of life that i never wanted to end

marlisa

my review: Stunning. 200 pages of pure poetry. 

jake's review: snoozefest

"Mr and Mrs Ramsay and their eight children have always holidayed at their summer house in Skye, surrounded by family friends. The novel's opening section teems with the noise, complications, bruised emotions, joys and quiet tragedies of everyday family life that might go on forever. But time passes, bringing with it war and death, and the summer home stands empty until one day, many years later, when the family return to make the long-postponed visit to the lighthouse. One of the great literary achievements of the twentieth century, To the Lighthouse is at once an intensely autobiographical and universally moving masterpiece."

To the Lighthouse (Vintage Classics Woolf Series)

iris 

nothing even happened bro wtf 🤣🤣🤣

Jim Hagan

Finished this after reading it about 6 years ago, and pleased to say it still garners 5 stars. Glad I reawakaned my memory to this startling book. The middle part particularly stood out to me as excellent this time around.

chris

mahek

"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."

--------------------

True to the classic Woolf style, To The Lighthouse is another powerful piece of writing that smoothly walks on a tight rope, an impeccable balance of past and present, emotion and projection, and a play on perspectives that shift between the personal and the physical.
This book is incredibly strong literary-wise, rolling with Woolf's signature flow-of-consciousness narrative that recalls the image of the sea she beautifully describes, piercing to the core of the human mind and psychology, and yet... Yet, as is the case with most of Virginia Woolf books I read, I have once again fallen just short of grasping onto it, with characters that are a little too vague, emotions a little too conceptual, a plot simultaneously simple yet too entangled.
It is beautiful writing, certainly, but be aware that its density might leave you overwhelmed, gasping for air by the time the story rolls to a close.
3.5/5

jack

somehow better than i remembered it <3. incredibly special.

Ayla Hawthorne

This book became much easier to read when I thought of it like long-form poetry instead of a Story. There are some beautiful lines, and I was definitely moved by the exploration of grief in parts two and three. Honestly the entire first part went over my head a little bit - I struggled to keep track of the characters and it was incredibly long winded considering there was minimal plot. I think I would get a lot more out of this story on a reread.

To The Lighthouse

No rating since I would like to sit with this a bit and maybe revisit in a different format.

Reading this as an audiobook may have been a bit of a mistake; it is just not the kind of book that lends itself well to the format. However, the prose was beautiful and Ruth Wilson's narration was incrdibly lyrical and enchanting.

No rating since I would like to sit with this a bit and maybe revisit in a different format.

Reading this as an audiobook may have been a bit of a mistake; it is just not the kind of book that lends itself well to the format. However, the prose was beautiful and Ruth Wilson's narration was incrdibly lyrical and enchanting.

Hannah Yang

"What is the meaning of life? That was all- a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years, the great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead, there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark; here was one."

"And as she looked at him she began to smile, for though she had not said a word, he knew, of course he knew, that she loved him. He could not deny it. And smiling she looked out of the window and said (thinking to herself, Nothing on earth can equal this happiness) [...] And she looked at him smiling. For she had triumphed again. She had not said it: yet he knew."

"They had not needed to speak. They had been thinking the same things and he had answered her without her asking him anything."

"Yes, she thought, laying down her brush in extreme fatigue, I have had my vision."

what a beautiful, beautiful novel. the blurb of my book says that it gives "language to the silent space that separates people and the space that they transgress to reach each other," and i don't think i can put it any better than that. graciously expresses the give-and-take, unstated transactions, and profound comfort of relationships (to others, to ourselves, to our work).

Cheyenne Willis

It's a fascinating and moving story, but I struggled with the writing style - it was difficult sometimes to understand what I was reading

Jamieson

“What is the meaning of life? That was all- a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years, the great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead, there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark; here was one.” 


I had the most unusual experience reading this where I enjoyed every page but simultaneously was wishing and hoping something would happen. There's very few actual lighthouses in this book, most of it follows various characters over an afternoon and evening as they ponder their relationships with eachother and their various anxieties about life and love and family are slowly explored. 

Woolf is a phenomenal writer and that can't be argued. Her prose is stunning, and this book feels like something only one person could write. Woolf manages to capture the transient nature of time and the flow and ebb of time between one moment to the next and that is no easy feat. Part two, "Time Passes", especially, stood out to me in this book. The death of the characters so unceremoniously announced in bracketed footnotes was a unique choice, and a uniquely modernist choice, and I found that I kind of liked it. 

I think I'd like to read more Woolf for sure, Orlando might be up next. This is not what I expected, and I can't explain it to you because it's not about what its ABOUT but I enjoyed reading in nonetheless and could even see myself rereading it in the future. 


  “And all the lives we ever lived and all the lives to be are full of trees
and changing leaves.”

Shona Tiger

Stream of consciousness again; so, Mrs Dalloway; but (interminably) longer. Racist ("she stood screwing up her little Chinese eyes in her small puckered face", "With her little Chinese eyes and her puckered-up face, she would never marry", etc. Repulsive.). 

A wonderful study of people; but why must we study in so much bewildering depth?

andrea

my advice on what mindset you need when starting to the lighthouse is: patience and focus. woolf is demanding with the reader. she wants your entire attention for a text that is complex in its prose, for sentences so long that you might (and you will) get lost, for a narrator that jumps from one character's subjectivity to that of another without giving previous warning. 

but this book is so rewarding, so rich when you stratch its surface. once you understand what is requested from you by woolf, it is a very pleasant journey. because to the lighthouse is in itself simply a journey in media res with no apparent goal, a stream of consciousness with no end.

it is a story about feelings, about complex human relationships, about time and love and death and loneliness and one's perspective of the person sitting next to you.
this is one work that i'm sure i will reread in the far future, and it will be even more enlightening because i know it is going to be an entirely different experience.

Donna

** spoiler alert **
           It was painful. Excruciating.

I struggled reading Virginia Woolf’s classic, “To the Lighthouse”. It’s the most challenging book I’ve read. I read and parsed every other sentence, on average, three times over, to even begin to get a whiff sense of what’s happening. It sapped my literary stamina. I muddled methodically through it over one and a half month, on and off reading. And when I was through, not without a deep sense of relief, I knew instinctively that it’s the most influential book I’ve read. *Ever.*

So, my favorite Virginia Woolf's quote? 

I have more than one favorite. But I want to share just two which made me contemplate more about life.

*"A sort of transaction went on between them, in which she was on one side, and life was on another, and she was always trying to get the better of it, as it was her"*

It's something that always encourages me to take control of my life and gain momentum even when I feel close to giving up. And I said this because, Woolf made me realize that she had gone through the same, that she had to battle through life and had to struggle relentlessly to get the better of it. And just the knowledge that there were people before me who have had struggled much and that I am not alone, comforts and inspires me to keep moving on. *yes, we always have to batter our ways through life*

The second quote - *"Arrange whatever pieces come your way."*

I like this because, well, how else must we live? :)

Isabella

Elle Geoghegan 

audrey 🪐

Anna Brunner

“It was necessary now to carry everything a step further. With her foot on the threshold she waited a moment longer in a scene which was vanishing even as she looked, and then, as she moved and took Minta’s arm and left the room, it changed, it shaped itself differently; it had become, she knew, giving one last look at it over her shoulder, already the past.”

To the Lighthouse

Reviews

Highlights