To The Lighthouse

To the Lighthouse, a novel by Virginia Woolf was published in 1927. This book is one of her most successful experiments in the stream-of-consciousness style. The three parts of the book take place between 1910 and 1920 and describe the stories of different members of the Ramsay family during visits to their summer home on the Isle of Skye in Scotland. In the first part, the reader sees the world through Mrs. Ramsay's eyes as she manages her kids and a gathering of guests during the summer holidays. In the second part of the book, Woolf tells the time passage by portraying the changes created in the summer home over 10 years. The third part relates to the returns of the Ramsay children, presently grown, and Lily Briscoe, a painter, and friend of the family. Her successful completion of a painting that she had been working on since the start of the book is symbolic of this unification.