To the lighthouse

Description

Described by Virginia Woolf herself as ‘easily the best of my books’, and by her husband Leonard as a ‘masterpiece’, To the Lighthouse, first published in 1927, is one of the milestones of Modernism. Set on the Isle of Skye, over a decade spanning the First World War, the narrative centres on the Ramsay family, and is framed by Mrs Ramsay’s promise to take a trip to the lighthouse the next day – a promise which isn’t to be fulfilled for a decade. Flowing from character to character and from year to year, the novel paints a moving portrait of love, loss and perception.Bearing all the hallmarks of Woolf’s prose, with her delicate handling of the complexities of human relationships, To the Lighthouse has earned its reputation – frequently appearing in lists of the best novels of the twentieth century, it has lost not an iota of brilliance.