To the Lighthouse in Overdue Podcast

Mar 29, 2016 Thekelburrows rated it it was amazing

It's 2016 and the SparkNotes for many important works of the English canon are available online for free. I love you, 2016. ...more

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Aug 10, 2014 tysephine rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, fiction

We start with a group of people staying at a seaside house in Cornwall, where young James (aged 6) asks his mother if they are going to the lighthouse tomorrow. The mother, Mrs. Ramsay, says of course, but the father says a decisive no. Mrs. Ramsay is very unhappy that he should burst her son's bubble in such a gruff manner, and so we are brought into the lives of this group of people.

At this seaside house we have: the Ramsays and their children, their neighbor Mr. Carmichael, Lily Briscoe, Mint We start with a group of people staying at a seaside house in Cornwall, where young James (aged 6) asks his mother if they are going to the lighthouse tomorrow. The mother, Mrs. Ramsay, says of course, but the father says a decisive no. Mrs. Ramsay is very unhappy that he should burst her son's bubble in such a gruff manner, and so we are brought into the lives of this group of people.

At this seaside house we have: the Ramsays and their children, their neighbor Mr. Carmichael, Lily Briscoe, Minta Doyle, Paul Rayley, Charles Tansley, and varied servants, etc. Woolf doesn't explain who these people are to one another or how they all ended up at this seaside house together. I guess they're all friends somehow. At any rate, they are all there at the house.

In the first part, we spend the day with this group, getting a feel for their relationships with one another, who they are. This section honestly bored me to tears and literally put me to sleep a couple times. So much description and so little action.

The second part got more interesting. It quickly speeds through 10 years in the lives of these people. Who lives, who dies. A war happens. It places these life events alongside the slow disintegration of the seaside house. Life goes on, but neglected seaside houses from earlier, better times will slowly rot. It is beautifully handled.

The third section brings the remaining people back after 10 years away. Lily Briscoe, Mr. Carmichael, Mr. Ramsay, and 2 of the children (James and Cam) come back. We see them basically repeat events from 10 years before, except this time the Ramsays finally make it to the lighthouse.

As I was reading the last section, I kept getting the feeling that Mr. Ramsay was in some way trying to right his wrongs from 10 years previous by finally taking his son to the lighthouse. It had made his wife so unhappy that they had disappointed James in that way, and I felt that going to the lighthouse was Mr. Ramsay's apology to his dead wife.

I got the sense that this was Woolf's way of exploring how it is to go back to places after long times have passed. There is this perfect memory from long ago that cannot be revisited, because life carries on while you are gone. I really enjoyed that aspect of the novel, but the first section is so dull that it took me a while to appreciate this message. ...more

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