On Narrative Techniques In To The Lighthouse

In the early 20th century, the turbulent English society was beset with crises in politics, economy, culture and ideology. Great changes took place not only in man's concept of himself but also at all levels of the society. In literature, modernism arose as a trend drifting away from the 19th century realism.As one of the leading modernist novelists, Virginia Woolf has contributed significantly to the development of modern novel in both theory and practice. She asserted that subjective and internal reality was more important than any sort of external factors. Woolf's concept of reality essentially means subjectivity. She abandoned traditional fictional devices and formulated her own distinctive techniques. The novels of Woolf tend to be less concerned with outward reality than with the inner life. Her masterpiece, To the Lighthouse, serves as an excellent sample in analyzing Woolf's literary theory and her experimental techniques.In this novel, the structure of external objective events is diminished in scope and scale, or almost completely dissolved. It is composed of the continual activity of characters' consciousness and shower of impressions. Woolf minimized the authoritative external narrator and employed the limited point of view. She gave the reader insight into the inner worlds of her characters by presenting their feelings, thoughts, memories, etc. Meanwhile, Woolf constantly shifted the viewpoints of different characters. She adopted the multiple points of view to serve twoOn Narrative Techniques in To the Lighthouseaims: rendering characterization subjectively and revealing "multipersonal subjectivity". In order to avoid obscurity caused by the frequently changing viewpoints, Woolf employed parentheses and repetition to indicate the shifting.Furthermore, Woolf employed free indirect discourse to achieve subjectivity. In To the Lighthouse, free indirect discourse is in the presence of third-person pronouns and past tense, which correspond with the form of narrative report. It typically involves a combination of language colored by a particular character's point of view with the narrator's perspective. Meanwhile, Woolf adopted free indirect discourse to remove narrative tag which interrupts the fluidity of the novel.By analyzing Woolf's artistic features in To the Lighthouse, especially the techniques of point of view and free indirect discourse, the author draws the conclusion that Virginia Woolf employed her individualized and experimental narrative techniques to achieve the core of her literary theory -subjectivity.Although the historical period when modernism acted as a main trend in literature has ended, the experimental techniques adopted by the modernist writers have further influence upon literary creation. Virginia Woolf's distinctive art of fiction has offered significance in studying the modern fiction as well as in literary creation.