V. WOOLF - To the Lighthouse




To the Lighthouse is generally considered to be V. Woolf’s most accomplished work. The vision of the book is an optimistic one. Out of the multiple oscillations between life and death, joy and sorrow, light and dark, ebb and flow of the sea, there is an expressed belief in the survival of the human spirit.
To the Lighthouse has a symbolic design, which gives coherence to the form of this abstract novel. Each and everyone of its section has a significant meaning:”The Window” symbolizes integration, “Time Passes”, symbolizes disintegration and “The Lighthouse” represents reintegration.
This light – dark – light pattern resembles with the beam from the lighthouse which functions centrally in the novel, both as a literal place and as a symbol. The novel begins with a desire to visit the lighthouse and concludes with the journey to it, so the lighthouse is bound up with the journey theme of the novel.
Mrs. Ramsay is the central character of this novel, being both a symbol and an individual. She is the mother of eight children, a beautiful woman who finds a great pleasure in matchmaking, always trying to build bridges between people, a practical nurse and noble hostess.
Mr. Ramsay is a different person from his wife, representing a kind of embodiment of the masculine principle: self-centered, objective, melodramatic and in constant need of love. Mrs. and Mr. Ramsay represent for the author two opposing approaches to life and reality. He is the cynical realist while she has warmth and intuitive power to understand life and people. The limitation and failure of Mr. Ramsay, thinking and judgment are reflected in the fact that he fragments knowledge in an alphabetic arrangement, lacking the wisdom of an integrated view of life.
The meaning of symbols in “To the Lighthouse” is directly related to V. Woolf’s concepts of human values and reality. She considered that the most important thing about any person is his quest for the meaning of life