This analysis investigates Woolf’s novel To the Lighthouse, which creates a kind of assessment regarding human reality and values and criticizes and examines the multifaceted workings of people’s inner lives. In this narrative, the author depicts life itself through matriarchy and patriarchal positions in the family. This study’s fundamental concern is exploring Woolf’s novel To the Lighthouse in connection to patriarchal and matriarchal concepts. More specifically, this study offers an in-depth analysis of memories as captured by Woolf in To the Lighthouse, which corresponds to the specific lens of this essay. Basirizadeh et al. (68) state that “the psychological time, the space occupied by the mind in its memory, perceptions, and feelings, is the type of time viewed by Bergson as spiritual.” Findings from this study indicate that Mrs. Ramsey dwells in the minds of those who knew her the ravage of time negated. The purposeless shawl, the hanging, the falling apart, and the unseen seemingly mock memory, and from under its folds, the untouched-by-time skulls emerge; hence death is the victor, as implied by Woolf.
Memories through the Associative Thought
The associative thought captured in the form of intermingling psychic time and objective time and the subjective experience is dominant throughout Woolf’s novel To the Lighthouse. According to Heather (par. 7), this associative thought is founded on memory, senses, and imagination. This means associative thinking or free association deals with the Freudian analysis method, mainly engrossed in the similarity drawn between varied this founded on personal experience. In the first part of Woolf’s novel, “The Window,” a parallel is drawn between the picture of Mrs. Ramsey and Queen Victoria. The “Fisherman’s Wife” narration is similarly quite significant in the first part of this novel (Heather par. 7). While Mrs. Ramsey narrates this tale to James, research findings indicate that the exterior occurrences are freely related to the novel itself. In this novel, the concept of memory is also captured in the connection between Virginia Woolf and the stream of consciousness. As further noted by Heather (par. 2), the events traditionally made relevant in making up a story are no longer relevant to the author. Instead, what mattered to the author was the impression made on the characters who experienced different forms of memory. The omniscient narrator in the novel disappeared; hence the point of view of love inside the characters’ minds through memories, an association of ideas, flashbacks, and instant impressions presented as constant fluxes (Heather par. 7).
Memory through the Utilization of varied Syntactic and Grammatical Structures
Woolf’s To the Lighthouse incorporates the “Stream of Consciousness” that has varied syntactic and grammatical structures because it utilizes human memories and thoughts as the foundation for writing fiction; hence human memories and thoughts are considered unsymmetrical (Heather par. 5). This technique is quite evident in the novel’s first part, “The Window.” The author utilizes parenthetical sentences and phrases when introducing the characters and offering an in-depth insight into the characters. The second part of Woolf’s novel, “Time Passes,” incorporates the parenthetical sentences in brackets as a means of telling about the death of Andrew Ramsey and Prue (Heather par. 5). This is intended to stick in the memories of the characters involved and the audience reading this novel. The utilization of repetitive ideas, thoughts, and phrases is quite substantial in the text, where the author employs the stream of consciousness and the ability to remember details about the characters’ past. The stream of consciousness is directly connected to the thought process hence repetitive and continuous. This repetition of memories, ideas, and thoughts is evident throughout the novel. For instance, Mrs. Ramsey initially thought the novel presented as a cohesive binding force for everyone and everything. The author presents Mrs. Ramsey as the cohesive force and the “center” that binds everything together. In the novel’s first part, Mrs. Ramsey’s sitting at the window is considered symbolic since she is presented as the binding force connecting the house and the outer worlds. In the second part of the novel, “Time Passes,” the author informs the audience that the repetitive imagery of darkness and death is presented, and people remember how it took over the Ramsey family in ten years. The last part of the novel further includes the idea of completion and harmony represented by the conclusion of the journey of Lilly Briscoe’s and Ramsey’s paintings which cast a long-lasting memory in the audience’s minds.
The Connection between Memories and Modernism in To the Lighthouse
KILINÇ (119) states that To the Lighthouse characterizes a noteworthy representation of Woolf’s unique style that incorporates themes of memory, time concept, losses in action, and change in characters’ lives individuals. The theme of memory in this novel is characterized by a stream of interior monologues and consciousness techniques to scrutinize the challenges associated with disappointed contemporary individuals. According to KILINÇ (120), this is due to the drastic changes and significant losses in daily life and culture. Critics, however, argue that this novel fails to reach a definite conclusion, leaving questions regarding the meaning of life unanswered. Instead of exclusively utilizing memories in writing the novel, research findings indicate that Woolf has created her modern fiction style by using the themes of death and life, confronting her readers with inevitable realities regarding the cruel world (KILINÇ 120). This novel carries numerous autobiographical elements and especially incorporates the author’s childhood memories. For instance, the author’s parents, Julia and Leslie Stephen, institute the birth of Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey in the novel. During the year of Woolf’s birth, KILINÇ (115) indicates that the family relocated to Talland House in St. Ives, Cornwall, during the summer, spending their time playing in the garden and walking along the coast while observing the Godrevy lighthouse. These memories create the foundation of the family scenes as represented in the section “The Window,” where the duo Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey visit the summer house together with their children in the Hebrides, a group of different islands in Scotland. Even though Mrs. Ramsey is wary of the imperfect nature of existence within her family, critics of this novel argue that her role in life is associated with bringing happiness and joy to people around her and comforting and protecting her children’s childhood enhancement (KILINÇ 115). Looking outside, Mrs. Ramsey is charming and disseminates peace and harmony. However, critics further argue that there is fear, conflict, and anxiety in Mrs. Ramsey’s inner world.
Memory and Art Therapy in To the Lighthouse
Memory and consciousness represent some means contributing to the quality of life and well-being (Ghasemi 1). Scholars and researchers argue that arts also follow this path to say that the author’s long-term memories regarding her childhood, which helped in creating To the Lighthouse, lead to her optimal life and well-being through the modulation of her feelings and emotions regarding her mother. The long-term memories of Woolf’s childhood play an essential role in the play to abolish the feud, the gap, and the difference between science and literature by tracing the origins of arts to the biological notions regarding memory and consciousness (Ghasemi 1). Woolf’s To the Lighthouse is created through long-term memory. Consequently, this creation leads to the author’s well-being because arts exhibit a therapeutic nature because of memory and consciousness. According to Salzman-Fiske (5), the memorial association helps to strengthen long-term memories. However, critics argue that memorial association leads to confabulation. In this sense, Woolf’s To the Lighthouse demonstrates a questioning regarding the learned notion of reality.
Critics further argue that this reality represents an exclusively subjective concept that inhibits specific experiences and events from becoming memory (Salzman-Fiske 5). Woolf’s parents represent the prototypes of Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay in the novel. When the author wrote this novel, Chen (9) stated that she heartily expressed her feelings by spilling all the memories in her mind for many years to create the ease and verve she had never had. Researchers and scholars acknowledge that it is worth mentioning that as a writer who sought harmony and aesthetics in her profession, the literary expression of trauma demonstrated by Woolf is not limited to her signs and symptoms of depression (Chen 34). Additionally, she does not indulge in the direct presentation and description of traumatic memories and events. Most of the time, Woolf simplifies the memories of traumatic events and attempts to demonstrate her feelings, understanding, and reactions to the event with the assistance of literary scenes or characters. In various instances, the author sublimates traumatic memories into a somewhat beautiful human emotion, which plays an essential role in making trauma expression aesthetic (Chen 34).
Exposing the Memories of Cruelty of War by the Structure in To the Lighthouse
Woolf’s novel is divided into three parts, namely “Time Passes,” “The Window,” and “The Lighthouse.” On the surface and from the plot’s development, the novel follows an old-fashioned physical chronological order, telling the changes of the Ramsays over ten years (Chen 35). In the structure’s setting, the author successfully utilizes psychological time, breaks the boundaries of space and time, and adopts the cross-narrative structure by combining memories of the past, the present, and the future to make the entire work concise in the narrative but filled with tension. The first part of this novel mainly records the evening activities of a family. In contrast, the second part is intentionally condensed into a few pages, and the final part describes simple activities of a particular morning. As noted by Chen (35), the diluted plots and simple scenes of parts one and two of the novel are filled with a series of memories and thoughts of the characters since a few hours of physical time has unlimited psychological time. However, the critics of this novel argue that the ten-year changes within the middle part of the novel are lightly passing by the deliberate objective description of the author to form a “long-short-long” structure (Chen 35). This aligns with the “peace-war-peace” demonstrated by the development of human society. It reflects human nature, including happiness (people cherish tasting it repeatedly) and disaster that no one dares to discuss. The layout of Woolf’s overall length in the novel To the Lighthouse reflects this mentality.
Conclusion
Woolf depicts life itself through matriarchy and patriarchal positions in the family. In this novel, the concept of memory is captured in the connection between Virginia Woolf and the stream of consciousness. The novel integrates the “Stream of Consciousness” with wide-ranging syntactic and linguistic structures because it exploits human memories and thoughts as the basis for writing fiction. In this regard, human memories and thoughts are considered unsymmetrical. Woolf’s novel exemplifies a significant depiction of Woolf’s exceptional style that integrates themes of memory, time concept, losses in action, and changes in characters’ lives for the individuals. Critics argue that Woolf’s To the Lighthouse fails to reach a definite conclusion, leaving questions regarding the meaning of life unanswered. Memories create the foundation of the family scenes, as represented in the section “The Window.” Memory and consciousness characterize some means contributing to the quality of life and well-being. The long-term memories of the author’s childhood play an indispensable role in eradicating the dispute, the gap, and the variance between science and literature. This is achieved by tracing the origins of arts to the biological notions regarding memory and consciousness.
Works Cited
Basirizadeh, Fatemeh Sadat, et al. “Concept of Time in Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse: Bergsonian Study.” LingLit Journal Scientific Journal for Linguistics and Literature 2.2 (2021): 67-74.
Chen, Shuo. Moments of Being, A Real Trauma Truth of Virginia Woolf. MS thesis. UiT Norges arktiske universitet, 2022.
Ghasemi, Parvin, Samira Sasani, and Jafar Abbaszadeh. “To the Lighthouse: Memory and Art Therapy.” Forum for World Literature Studies. Vol. 10. No. 2. Wuhan Guoyang Union Culture & Education Company, 2018.
Heather, Roetto. “†œWhat a Lark! What a Plunge! †The influence of Sigmund Freud on Virginia Woolf.” International Journal of English and Literature 10.3 (2019): 21-30.
KILINÇ, ÇAĞLA. “THE IDEA OF MODERNISM IN VIRGINA WOOLF’S TO THE LIGHTHOUSE.” JOURNAL OF MODERNISM AND POSTMODERNISM STUDIES (JOMOPS) 1.1 (2020): 112-120.
Salzman-Fiske, Rebecca H. “How the Mind Refigures Memory: The Role of Social Construction and Fallibility in the Fictions of Faulkner, Woolf, and Nabokov.” (2014).
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