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Character Analysis Of Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse

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According to Susan Dick, Woolf’s narrator moves freely among the characters, entering their minds and using a subtle blend of quoted and narrated monologue, supplemented by description, to reveal their inner lives. Readers know the characters as they know themselves and as they are known to one another. Although the narrator places the characters in the foreground of the narrative and generally blends her voice with theirs, she also maintains an independent point of view which enables her to speak in her own voice. The characters in “To the Lighthouse” are often captured in reverie that thinking requires on a more impersonal character. For example: Mrs. Ramsay in the dining room after her children have disappeared to their rooms (pg: 8-9 …show more content…

Ramsay, who had been sitting loosely, folding her son in her arm, braced herself, and, half turning, seemed to raise herself with an effort, and at once to pour erect into the air a rain of energy, a column of spray, looking at the same time animated and alive as if all her energies were being fused into force, burning and illuminating (quietly though she sat, taking up …show more content…

Ramsey’s son hating him. She also gives an explanation of the reasons that his son hates him. His son feels that Mr. Ramsey interferes with many of his actions with his mom, and this is where Woolf introduces imagery to explain the feelings and actions of these characters. Woolf uses visual imagery in order to describe the feelings and opinions of each character in this first part of the novel. Also, the personality of Mrs. Ramsey is described with interest and statement. Woolf writes “Mrs. Ramsey, who had been sitting loosely, folding her son in her arm, braced herself, and, half turning, seemed to raise herself with an effort, and at once to pour erect into the air as a rain of energy, a column of spray, looking at the same time animated and alive” and this shows how Woolf uses imagery to explain the present condition in which Mrs. Ramsey is in. That describes how Woolf wants women to be observed by the reads, due to the fact that most of her writing styles include themes of feminist views. She uses visual imagery in order to contrast the characters and show their real feelings and how they change throughout the story. (elaborated from

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