one has need of fifty eyes

Why do I love To The Lighthouse so much?

One reason is its beauty. I love Woolf’s word usage: “fringed with joy,” “sunk in a green-grey somnolence,” “in a vast and benevolent lethargy of well-wishing,” “torches lolloping red and gold,” etc. Really: lolloping torches! That phrase struck me like so many Emily Dickinson images have, because of its freshness and aptness. I savored the lusciousness of Woolf’s prose to the last punctuation mark.

I also love it because it resonates poignantly with my own experiences. I can empathize with insufferable Tansley, who longs to “assert himself,” who is so prickly and lonesome and unhappy. I too battle with the destructive urges that compel him to disagreeable behaviors. I can relate to Lily, striving for integrity and wholeness in the midst of a thousand expectations that she fears she’ll never live up to (and perhaps does not desire to live up to). I also feel uncomfortably akin with Mr. Ramsey, his egoism and hunger for validation, his lack of humanity, and his blindness to the riches right at his fingertips. Mrs. Ramsey’s character allures me: her efforts against the inexorable fragmenting forces of life, her mission to thrust fellowship and meaning into interactions (even at the cost of her own need of privacy), her selfless energy. I cannot dislike any one character, not even Tansley, not even Mr. Ramsey, because I connect strongly with all of them. Nor can I overwhelmingly like any character—not Lily, not Mr. Bankes or Mrs. Ramsey—because they are depicted as human: flawed, petty, isolated.

I love how Woolf infuses the idea of what it means to be a woman into this novel: the incredible reserves of resilience, physical and emotional stamina, love, patience, and selflessness that are required of a wife or mother; the inescapable expectations that are held up to a woman in any phase of life; the difficulty of forging an inimitable self, beyond the roles that so easily engulf a woman’s personality. Even more, I found her depiction of humanity compelling: the inconsistency between ideals and realities that torments and baffles us, and our quest for ultimate meaning, validation, and love. To The Lighthouse made my heart ache, while at the same time making me giddily aware of the glory and intricacy of this complicated world. It filled me with a strong impulse to express grace in every way imaginable to all the people I encounter. I think it made me fall in love with the world and everyone in it, all over again.