To The Lighthouse
by Virginia Woolf
The novel is set in the summer home of an English family, changing the perspectives of each character's stream of consciousness, reminding them of children's emotions and the stresses of adult relationships. Shifts occur even in the middle of a sentence, and in a sense they resemble a rotating beam of a lantern. A monument to high modernism and one of Wolfe's finest works. The lighthouse, carefree and mother Mrs. Ramsay attracts the tragic but absurd Mr. Ramsay, as well as children and various guests who are on holiday on the Isle of Skye. With a seemingly insignificant postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Virginia Woolf offers a poignant glimpse into the complex tensions and fidelity of family life and the conflicts within marriage.
