A review by niallgoulding1
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.5
I have great admiration for this book and glad I read it. The prose is spectacular - so intricate with layers upon layers of nuance. It'd be impossible to read this without falling in love with a few passages on the meaning of life and human relationships.
However, that intricacy made this a really hard read for me. There are sentences within sentences within sentences. I lost count of the number of times I had to reread sentences to decipher their meaning. As an example the idea "aren't things spoiled by saying them" is written "aren't things spoiled then, Mrs Ramsey may have asked (it seemed to have happened often this silence by her side) by saying them?". There's obviously way more depth and context to the latter but by God its not a casual read.
For a shortish book, it took me a long time to finish. An admirable book but one that needs to be read in the right conditions. In hindsight, I wish Id read this when I had a week off and could read big chunks during the day. Didn't lend itself well to reading before bed and made it a bit of a slog
However, that intricacy made this a really hard read for me. There are sentences within sentences within sentences. I lost count of the number of times I had to reread sentences to decipher their meaning. As an example the idea "aren't things spoiled by saying them" is written "aren't things spoiled then, Mrs Ramsey may have asked (it seemed to have happened often this silence by her side) by saying them?". There's obviously way more depth and context to the latter but by God its not a casual read.
For a shortish book, it took me a long time to finish. An admirable book but one that needs to be read in the right conditions. In hindsight, I wish Id read this when I had a week off and could read big chunks during the day. Didn't lend itself well to reading before bed and made it a bit of a slog