Virginia Woolf : the novels

At the beginning of the 20th century, Virginia Woolf reacted against literary tradition, sought a new definition of fiction, applied her modern, post-Freudian outlook and radically feminist ideas to the problem of writing novels and, in so doing, helped re-define our concept of this literary form.

The results can be seen in "Mrs Dalloway", "To the Lighthouse" and "The Waves", three novels of a flowing, impressionistic texture that are, at the same time, highly structured.

Through detailed analysis of selected extracts from the novels, the text aims to teach the reader to explore Woolf's writing and to inquire into the significance of her ironies and symbolic structures.

This title is for A Level and first-year undergraduate students of English Literature; those on courses in 20th-century literature, language and narrative, and the novel.