The Concept Of Time In Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse

"This extraordinary discrepancy between time on the clock and time in the mind is less known than it should be and deserves fuller investigation." (Virginia Woolf, Orlando). This is properly the reason why all of Virginia Woof 's novels, to some extent, experiment upon the concept of time. In “To the Lighthouse”, the author dismisses the popular notion of time being the governing force, controlling individuals’ action and not decelerating for anybody. On the contrary, time exists within individuals and the characters are capable of slowing down the time. This slowed-down concept of time has remarkable consequences, both on readers’ perception of the novel and on the novel structure itself.

“To the Lighthouse” is restricted to a duration of ten years. The novel is composed of three parts, each of which envisions time distinctly. Woolf conceives of time in the first chapter “The Window” as a matter of psychology rather than chronology. She establishes what Henry Bergson, an eminent French philosopher, termed durée, a theory suggesting that the world is internal and intuitive rather than external and material. Although forming two-thirds of the novel, this section only concerns minute details of a September afternoon and evening, but within this, simultaneously illustrates a wide variety of times, enabling us to follow the chain of thoughts of key figures in the novel. For instance, in chapter twelve, Mr. Ramsey recollects his past :“ Years ago, before he had married, […], he