The Hours

Mrs. Dalloway is a classic feminist novel and an exemplar of stream-of-consciousness narration, a style that Woolf helped develop. Reading the novel that inspired The Hours illuminates the full extent of the intertextuality between the two novels. The work is now in the public domain.

• Mrs. Dalloway on SuperSummary

To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf (1927)

This three-part novel, set between 1910-1920, follows a family’s visits to the Scottish Isle of Skye. The work epitomizes Woolf’s lyrical stream-of-consciousness style and includes very little dialogue, though the narration shifts between different characters’ thoughts. In 1998, the Modern Library assigned the novel 15th place on a list of 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century, and in 2005, TIME magazine placed it among the 100 best English-language novels since 1923. The narrative presents themes of impermanence, subjectivity, and gender roles.

• To The Lighthouse on SuperSummary