To the Lighthouse Reflection | Teen Ink

To the Lighthouse Reflection

March 21, 2021
By Anonymous

To the Lighthouse is a novel written by Virginia Woolf. Focusing on the main characters in the story: Mrs. Ramsay with an omniscient third-person point of view. The author herself, Virginia Woolf, lived near a lighthouse during his childhood age and therefore wrote a similar story telling each character conflict and how they solve with their individual conflict with the major theme of “going to the lighthouse”

The plot itself isn’t that attractive but only tells a normal family with eight children. It was majorly split into three parts, the first part is planning to go to the lighthouse, but eventually failed because of Mr. Ramsay's rejection. Second, the how individual character change toward the third part-Going to the lighthouse. 

The main themes of this book can be categorized as man versus man, where each one of them has issues they are not satisfied with or conflicts they have with another person. Mrs. Ramsay, constantly view as the protagonist of the story, was surrounded by trivial events as the “mother” for eight children. Through the first part, we know that although with all of the issues in the house that is going on, she is able to manage it, even hosting a dinner party at the end of Part One. That is a huge contrast between her and her husband-Mr. Ramsay, who tends to believe that he has the authority over the house, and all of the generations should remember him but not his wife for doing all of the trivial issues. He is selfish, constantly asking or demanding others. 

Other minor themes that are being described in the book are the discrimination between gender. In the age when it was written, women still didn't have the right as men did. They don’t usually receive an education, and some are treated differently than men. Lily Briscoe, a painter, is an example to demonstrate this theme. She started with a painting of Mrs. Ramsay but did not finish because others discouraging her and undermine her confidence. 

The book ends with Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay traveling to the Lighthouse with the youngest son-James and Cam. James nearly shares the same quality as his father at the time they went to the Lighthouse, which he himself hates not only because it is morally wrong but also his father rejects his request to the lighthouse 10 years early.



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