Interpreting the Time Passes section of Woolf's To the Lighthouse

And then we get to the strange and short 2nd section of Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, about 20 pp (after a first section of about 180 pp.), titled "Time Passes," and that's what it is - we observe teh house gradually decay, w/ a few odd paens to the change of seasons - some of the descriptions of seasons coming on are dark and foreboding, obviously VW was a troubled soul in many ways, unable to take solace in nature, threatened all the time - and, notably, "updates" on the main characters of the novel and what happened to them during the years of Time Passes: first, the main character, Mrs. Ramsay, is curtly dismissed from the novel as we observe her husband on the day after she died "suddenly" (which really means "unexpectedly," as all deaths are in a way sudden - newspaper reporters learn this distinction) - so she's "suddenly" gone from this novel. We also learn that the oldest and smartest of the Ramsay children died in the War (first World War), and that the beautiful daughter married and then died a year later in childbirth. The only other "update" is on the slovenly poet, Carmichael, who had an "unexpected" success with the book of poems he completed during the war years - seems the war increased the public interest in poetry (perhaps it did, but we would think primarily of the war poets such as Brooke rather than an old Classicist). And then we learn that the family, or some of what remains of the Ramsay family, wants to return to the house on Skye, so the servants man up and in a frenzy clean and repair the dilapidated house. So what to make of this section: First, it's almost a novel in inverse; VW has less interest in her characters than in their house, and she completely steps away from scenes of life and death (and combat), the very stuff of most novels. Second, the attitude to the serving class remains extremely condescending - we know little or nothing about their interior lives, they seem to jump at the commands of the home owners, never showing anger or regret, they're props that make the life of the Ramsay family and their entourage possible (and comfortable). Third, Woolf steers away from the most dramatic years of British life in her time and is decidedly unwilling to write about the War Years - and even her reference to a successful publication during the war years seems to have nothing to do w/ the war. What a strange, and sad, novel.

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