This document discusses Virginia Woolf's use of stream of consciousness in her novel To the Lighthouse. It provides context on the definition and origins of stream of consciousness as a literary technique pioneered by writers like Woolf and Joyce. The document then examines several examples of stream of consciousness passages from To the Lighthouse, noting Woolf's use of focalization on inner thoughts with no clear narrative structure, informal language, and interconnecting sentences to represent the flow of a character's thoughts. Key characters like Mrs. Ramsay and Lily Briscoe are analyzed for how their thoughts are revealed through this technique.

1. Stream of Consciousness
in
To the Lighthouse

2. Definition
Outline
Origin
Features
Signs
Examples
Activities
Importance
References
Terms
Differences

3. Definition
Stream of Consciousness is a literary
technique which was pioneered by Dorthy
Richardson, Virginia Woolf, and James
Joyce. Stream of consciousness is
characterized by a flow of thoughts and
images, which may not always appear to
have a coherent structure or cohesion. The
plot line may weave in and out of time and
place, carrying the reader through the life
span of a character or further along a
timeline to incorporate the lives (and
thoughts) of characters from other time
periods.

4. * A literary technique that reveals the
flow of thoughts and feelings of
characters through long passages of
soliloquy.

5. Referenc
e

6. William James
The Principles of
Psychology
(1890)

7. Other Terms

8. The
decay of
the
plot

9. The decay of the
Character

10. Death of the author

11. Features
* Use of informal, colloquial
language .
* Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.
* No first-person but figural narrative mode.
* The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.
* The breaking of Grammatical rules.
* Punctuation is neglected.

12. The difference between the Stream
of Consciousness and
Interior Monologue

13. Interior Monologue  A stylized way of thinking out loud. (Technically: thinking
‘on the page’.)
 Unlike stream-of-consciousness, an interior monologue can
be integrated into a third-person narrative. The point of
view of character’s thoughts are woven into authorial
description, using their own language.
 This is the essential difference between interior monologue
and straight narrative :
:
 Narrative = the narrator talking ( ‘the narrator’ – that made-up
character who sounds like the author.
 Interior Monologue = a character talking/thinking, using
words ,specific to that character, making assumptions,
mistaken judgments, .
Note: If interior monologue is done well, you won’t even
notice

14. Stream of Consciousness
 Another stylized way of thinking out loud.
 The term ‘stream of consciousness’ is very similar to
interior monologue – and used interchangeably
by some – but this refers more specifically to a first
person narrative which mimics the jumble of
thoughts, emotions and memories passing through
a character’s mind. (Interior monologue is not
necessarily written in first person.)
 Stream of consciousness tends to be less ordered
than interior monologue. Consciousness has no
beginning and no end – thoughts flit quite
randomly from one thing to another.

15. The Window Chapter 1
“Had there been an axe handy, a poker, or any
weapon that would have gashed a hole in his
father’s breast and killed him, there and then,
James would have seized it. Such were the
extremes of emotion that Mr Ramsay excited in
his children’s breasts by his mere presence;
standing, as now, lean as a knife, narrow as the
blade of one, grinning sarcastically, not only
with the pleasure of disillusioning his son and
casting ridicule upon his wife, who was ten
thousand times better in every way than he was
(James thought)”

16. Keyword
James thought

17. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

18. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“Who was ten
thousand times better
in every way than he
was (James thought)”
“there and then, James
would have seized it.”

19. * Use of informal, colloquial language .
“Had there been an axe handy, a
poker, or any weapon that would have
gashed a hole in his father’s breast and
killed him”

20. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

21. The Window Chapter 1
“Yes, he did say disagreeable things, Mrs.
Ramsay admitted; it was odious of him to rub
this in, and make
James still more disappointed; but at the
same time, she would not let them laugh at
him. ‘The atheist’, they
called him; ‘the little atheist’, Rose mocked
him; Prue mocked him; Andrew, Jasper, Roger
mocked him;
even old Badger without a tooth in his head
had ”bit him

22. Keyword
Mrs. Ramsay admitted

23. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

24. “but at the same time, she would
not let them laugh at him”
* No first-person but figural narrative mode.

25. * Use of informal, colloquial language .
‘The atheist’, they
called him; ‘the little atheist’,

26. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

27. “There’ll be no landing at the Lighthouse tomorrow,” said
Charles Tansley, clapping his hands together as he stood at
the window with her husband. Surely, he had said enough.
She wished they would both leave her and James alone and
go on talking. She looked at him. He was such a miserable
The Window Chapter 1
specimen, the children said, all humps and hollows. He
couldn’t play cricket; he poked; he shuffled. He was a
sarcastic brute, Andrew said. They knew what he liked best
— to be for ever walking up and down, up and down, with
Mr Ramsay, and saying who had won this, who had won
that, who was a “first rate man” at Latin verses, who was
“brilliant but I think fundamentally unsound,” who was
undoubtedly the “ablest fellow in Balliol,” who had buried his
light temporarily at Bristol or Bedford, but was bound to be
heard of later when his Prolegomena, of which Mr Tansley
had the first pages in proof with him if Mr Ramsay would like
to see them, to some branch of mathematics or philosophy
saw the light of day. That ”was what they talked about.

28. Keyword
She wished

29. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

30. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
”“leave her
“She looked at him.”
“She wished”

31. * Use of informal, colloquial language .
“He was such a
miserable specimen, the
children said, all humps
and hollows. He couldn’t
play cricket; he poked;
he shuffled. He was a
sarcastic brute, Andrew
said.”

32. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

33. The Window Chapter 5
“And even if it isn’t fine tomorrow,” said Mrs
Ramsay, raising her eyes to glance at William
Bankes and Lily Briscoe as they passed, “it
will be another day. And now,” she said,
thinking that Lily’s charm was her Chinese
eyes, aslant in her white, puckered little face,
but it would take a clever man to see it, “and
now stand up, and let me measure your leg,”
for they might go to the Lighthouse after all,
and she must see if the stocking did not need
to be an inch or two ”longer in the leg.

34. Smiling, for it was an admirable idea, that
had flashed upon her this very second —
William and Lily should marry — she took the
heather-mixture stocking, with its criss-cross
of steel needles at the mouth of it, and
measured it against James’s leg.
“My dear, stand still,” she said, for in his jealousy,
not liking to serve as measuring block for the
Lighthouse keeper’s little boy, James fidgeted
purposely; and if he did that, how could she see,
was it too long, was it too short? she asked.
She looked up — what demon possessed him, her
youngest, her cherished?—

35. Keywords
Thinking Smiling, for it was an
admirable idea

36. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

37. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“she must see”
“her this very second”
“her youngest,
her cherished?”

38. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

39. The Window Chapter 8
“He said nothing. He took opium. The children said
he had stained his beard yellow with it. Perhaps.
What was obvious to her was that the poor man was
unhappy, came to them every year as an escape;
and yet every year she felt the same thing; he did
not trust her. She said, “I am going to the town. Shall
I get you stamps, paper, tobacco?” and she felt
him wince. He did not trust her. It was his wife’s
doing. She remembered that iniquity of his wife’s
towards him, which had made her turn to steel and
adamant there, in the horrible little room in St John’s
Wood, when with her own eyes she had seen that
odious woman turn him out of the house.”

40. The Window Chapter 8
“He was unkempt; he dropped things on
his coat; he had the tiresomeness of an
old man with nothing in the world to do;
and she turned him out of the room. She
said, in her odious way, “Now, Mrs
Ramsay and I want to have a little talk
together,”

41. Keywords
What was obvious to her
She remembered that iniquity
she felt the same thing

42. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

44. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“Obvious to her”
“He did not trust her”

45. * Use of informal, colloquial language .
when with her own eyes she had seen
that odious woman turn him out of the
house.”

46. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

47. The Window
Chapter
12
“His arm was almost like a young man’s
arm, Mrs. Ramsay thought, thin and hard,
and she thought with delight how strong
he still was, though he was over sixty, and
how untamed and optimistic, and how
strange it was that being convinced, as he
was, of all sorts of horrors, seemed not to
depress him, but to cheer him. Was it not
odd, she reflected? Indeed he seemed to
her sometimes made differently from other
people, born blind, deaf,’

48. “and dumb, to the ordinary things, but to the
extraordinary things, with an eye like an
eagle’s. His understanding often astonished
her. But did he notice the flowers? No. Did he
notice the view? No. Did he even notice his
own daughter’s beauty, or whether there was
pudding on his plate or roast beef? He would
sit at table with them like a person in a dream.
And his habit of talking aloud, or saying poetry
aloud, was growing on him, she was afraid; for
sometimes it was awkward”

49. Keyword
Mrs. Ramsay thought

50. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

51. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“She thought with
delight”

52. * Use of informal, colloquial language .
“he seemed to her sometimes
made differently from other
people, born blind, deaf, and
dumb, to the ordinary things,”

53. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

54. The Window
Chapter
10
“In a moment he would ask her, “Are we
going to the Lighthouse?” And she would
have to say, “No: not tomorrow; your
father says not.” Happily, Mildred came in
to fetch them, and the bustle distracted
them. But he kept looking back over his
shoulder as Mildred carried him out, and
she was certain that he was thinking, we
are not going to the Lighthouse tomorrow;
and she ”thought, he will remember that
all his life.

55. Keywords
She would have to say
He would ask her
She thought
She was certain that he was thinking

56. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

57. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“She was
certain”

58. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

59. The Window Chapter 4
“Never was anybody at once so ridiculous and so
alarming. But so long as he kept like that, waving,
shouting, she was safe; he would not stand still and
look at her picture. And that was what Lily Briscoe
could not have endured. Even while she looked at
the mass, at the line, at the colour, at Mrs Ramsay
sitting in the window with James, she kept a feeler
on her surroundings lest some one should creep
up, and suddenly she should find her picture
looked at. But now, with all her senses quickened
as they were, looking, straining, till the colour of the
wall and the jacmanna beyond burnt into her
eyes,”

60. “She was aware of someone coming out
of the house, coming towards her; but
somehow divined, from the footfall, William
Bankes, so that though her brush quivered,
she did not, as she would have done had
it been Mr Tansley, Paul Rayley, Minta
Doyle, or practically anybody else, turn
her canvas upon the grass, but let it stand.
William Bankes stood beside her.”

61. Keyword
She was aware of

62. * Focalization on inner thoughts and feelings.

63. * No first-person but figural narrative
mode.
“Her brush”
“Lily Briscoe could
not have endured”

64. * The flow of thoughts is represented by means of
long-winding, interconnected sentences.

65.  chapter xvii of the window begins with Mrs. Ramsay wondering
what she has done with her life, as she directs guests to their
seats and ladles out soup. she sees her husband at the far end
of the table, frowning. “what at? she did not know. she did not
mind. she could not understand how she had ever felt any
emotion or affection for him” . As she thinks about her
displeasure and disconnectedness with Mr. Ramsay. Mrs.
Ramsay notes that she would not speak out loud her inner
feelings. there is a strict difference between her actions and her
thoughts:
 .

66.  raising her eyebrows at the discrepancy—that was
what she was thinking, this was what she was
doing—ladling out soup—she felt, more and more
strongly, outside that eddy.
 being outside of the eddy is her sense of “being
past everything, through everything, out of
everything” . completely out of touch with Mr.
Ramsay and everyone else at the table, she instead
focuses on how shabby the room is, how sterile the
men are, and how she pities William Bankes.
finding meaning and strength again in her pity, she
gets past her mental weariness enough to ask him
an innocuous question about his letters

67.  The point of view shifts abruptly to Lily Briscoe,
who is watching Mrs. Ramsay intently and
imagining her thoughts. Lily is able to read
Mrs. Ramsay pretty clearly: “How old she
looks, how worn she looks, and how remote”
(84). She wonders why Mrs. Ramsay pities
William Bankes, and she realizes that “the life
in her, her resolve to live again, had been
stirred by pity” (84). Lily does not find Bankes
pitiable, but she recognizes that Mrs. Ramsay
is fulfilling some need of her own.

68.  Lily thinks about how Bankes has his work, then her
thoughts switch to her own work, and she starts
imagining her painting and the adjustments she will
make. As if to remind the readers of the setting, Woolf
has Lily take up “the salt cellar and put it down again
on a flower in pattern in the table-cloth, so as to
remind herself to move the tree” (84-85). After all of
Lily Briscoe’s thoughts, Mr. Bankes finally responds to
Mrs. Ramsay’s inquiry as to whether he has found his
letters.

69. By shifting the point of view from
character to character, Woolf shares
each character’s thoughts and
feelings, opinions and reactions to
one another. The dynamics between
the characters are expressed more
fully by their thoughts than by their
words. Woolf develops her characters
through their thoughts, memories,
and reactions to each
other

70. Importance
? ?
* How they feel about themselves.
* How they feel about other characters.
* Physical description.
* Different Events ( Past/ Present/ Future)