Search the Community

This came No# 16 in the BBC's 100 greatest British novels poll in 2016. It was the only book in the top 20 I had not read. It is as bad as I feared. An example of the writing style: 'I see the beetle,' said Susan. 'It is black, I see; it is green, I see; I am tied down with single words. But you wander off; you slip away; you rise up higher, with words and words in phrases.' I have another 157 pages of this.

What are your thoughts on To The Lighthouse ? Did you find it enjoyable ? Did you find it too complicated ? How did you find the narrative ? Did you know Virginia Woolf printed her own books initially, thousand anf thousands of them, in her own house ?

Like a lot of people, I'm a little bit in awe of Virginia. I've made a small dent in her already with mixed results which has made me more inclined to pick up those - if indeed there could be said to be any - that are more reader friendly. This will not do! It's too late now to read them in order which would've been the best way because she was constantly evolving and trying for something new .. but I will read them chronologically .. ish from now on (some of the essays and short stories were published posthumously as collections etc). Later down the line, when/if I have recovered and if the will is still there I may add books by other Bloomsbury members (Lytton Strachey and Leonard Woolf in particular) and associates (Vita Sackville West, Katherine Mansfield, Edith Sitwell & T.S. Eliot etc) but for now .. Virginia's work, and the biogs about her, are challenging enough. I've stocked up on migraine cures, sedatives and alcohol ... let's see if I can reach Mastermind status with my knowledge of the Woolf ( ) Progress 18/40 Fiction: Melymbrosia (an early version of The Voyage Out) The Voyage Out (1915) review Jacob's Room (1922) Mrs Dalloway (1925) To the Lighthouse (1927) review Orlando (1928) review The Waves (1931) Flush (1933) review The Years (1937) review Between the Acts (1941) Short Story Collections: Selected Short Stories A Haunted House A Society Monday or Tuesday An Unwritten Novel The String Quartet Blue and Green Kew Gardens The Mark on the Wall Solid Objects In the Orchard A Women's College from Outside The Lady in the Looking Glass The Shooting Party The Duchess and the Jeweller Lappin and Lapinova The Complete Shorter Fiction (1989) Biographies: Roger Fry (1940) Non-Fiction/Essays: The Common Reader (1925) A Room of One's Own (1929) review On Being Ill (1930) The London Scene (1931) The Common Reader - Second Series (1932) Three Guineas (1938) The Death of the Moth and other Essays (1942) The Moment and other Essays (1947) The Captain's Death Bed and other Essays (1950) Granite and Rainbow (1958) Books and Portraits (1978) Women and Writing (1979) Selected Letters (2008) Selected Diaries (2008) (having read these I would like to read the complete versions ... if I can track them down at a non-bankrupt inducing price ). Misc: Virginia Woolf: A Biography (1882-1912) - Quentin Bell (1976) review Virginia Woolf: A Biography (1912-1941) - Quentin Bell (1976) A Boy at the Hogarth Press - Richard Kennedy (1978) Thrown to the Woolfs: Leonard & Virginia Woolf and the Hogarth Press - John Lehman (1979) Deceived with Kindness: A Bloomsbury Childhood - Angelica Garnett (1985) The Letters of Vita Sackville West to Virginia Woolf - edited by Louise de Salvo (1992) Virginia Woolf - Hermione Lee (1997) review Love Letters: Leonard Woolf & Trekkie Ritchie Parsons (1941-1968) edited by Judith Adamson (2001) Mrs Woolf & the Servants - Alison Light (2007) Leonard Woolf: A Life - Victoria Glendinning (2007) Hyde Park Gate News - Virginia Woolf The Charleston Bulletin Supplements - Virginia Woolf & Quentin Bell .. so .. here we go ... I feel quite confident