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An Interpretation of To the lighthouse from the Perspective of Ecofeminism

Received: 9 February 2020     Published: 17 April 2020
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Abstract

Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece, To the Lighthouse, fully presents readers with her ecofeministic consciousness although ecofeminism did not come into existence in the era when she created this work. By analyzing the main characters the Ramsay couple and Lily Briscoe, this paper aims to interpret the ecofeminism reflected in this novel. Mr. Ramsay always ignores natural law, making no further progress in his career; Mrs. Ramsay enjoys the beauty of nature, making people around her happy and pleased; Lily alienates herself from nature, feeling puzzled about her painting. In terms of ecofeministic relationship between men and women, the differences in the values of the Ramsay couple result in the breaking up of their emotion, which stimulates Mr. Ramsay to accept some of the views of females; the reconciliation of Lily and Mr. Ramsay leads to their increasingly harmonious relation, which helps Lily achieve an ultimate completion of her painting. With her unique writing style, Virginia Woolf conveys to her readers the importance of achieving harmony between humans and nature and equality between men and women.

Published in International Journal of Literature and Arts (Volume 8, Issue 3)
DOI 10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17
Page(s) 148-152
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Ecofeminism, To the lighthouse, Virginia Woolf

References
[1] Sivaranjani, K. & S. Rajarajan. Eccentricity of Ecofeminism in the Select Novels of Virginia Woolf and Anita Desai [J]. English Studies International Research Journal, 2016 (4).
[2] Gao Feng. Towards Life Poetics: A Study of Virginia Woolf’s Theory of Fiction [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 2016.
[3] Hui Jingrui. Feminism Revealed from Lily’s Picture in To the Lighthouse [J]. Studies in Literature and Language, 2013 (3).
[4] Ordu, Ferhat. & Murat, Karakaş. Gender Politics in To the Lighthouse [J]. Journal of History Culture and Art Research, 2015 (3).
[5] Wang Nan. A study on the Trend of Virginia Woolf’s Feminist Poetics [D]. Liaoning University, 2017.
[6] Xin Linping. Research on the Value of Ecofeminism literary criticism [D]. Xi’an International Studies University, 2019.
[7] Sun Biru. A Study of Woolf’s Thought of Androgyny [D]. Northeast University, 2017.
[8] Wang Ping. An Eco-feminist Interpretation of To the Lighthouse [J]. Journal of Tianjin Foreign Studies University, 2007 (1).
[9] Lü Hongling. Emotion & Reason: A Study of Virginia Woolf’s Conception of Women’s Writing [M]. Nanjing: Nanjing Normal University Press, 2007.
[10] Zhao Jing. An Ecofeminist Interpretation of Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse [J]. Journal of Dalian Maritime University (Social Sciences Edition), 2008 (1).
[11] Shen Weiju. Ecofeministic Consciousness in Woolf's To the Lighthouse [J]. Journal of Gansu Normal Colleges, 2008 (1).
[12] Wen Jingjing. The Ecological Ethic Criticism on the 19th Century British Women Literature [M]. Beijing: National Defense Industry Press, 2015.
[13] Woolf, Virginia. To the Lighthouse [M]. London: Penguin Books, 1992.
[14] Shen Fuying. A Study on Woolf’s Ecological Awareness [M]. Jinan: Shandong University Press, 2011.
[15] Liu Shan. From "the Virgin Mary" to the Emergence of New Independent Women -- on the Female Images in To the Lighthouse [J]. Modern Chinese, 2016 (4).
Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    Lei Zhu, Fangting Shen. (2020). An Interpretation of To the lighthouse from the Perspective of Ecofeminism. International Journal of Literature and Arts, 8(3), 148-152. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17

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    ACS Style

    Lei Zhu; Fangting Shen. An Interpretation of To the lighthouse from the Perspective of Ecofeminism. Int. J. Lit. Arts 2020, 8(3), 148-152. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17

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    AMA Style

    Lei Zhu, Fangting Shen. An Interpretation of To the lighthouse from the Perspective of Ecofeminism. Int J Lit Arts. 2020;8(3):148-152. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17,
      author = {Lei Zhu and Fangting Shen},
      title = {An Interpretation of To the lighthouse from the Perspective of Ecofeminism},
      journal = {International Journal of Literature and Arts},
      volume = {8},
      number = {3},
      pages = {148-152},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijla.20200803.17},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijla.20200803.17},
      abstract = {Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece, To the Lighthouse, fully presents readers with her ecofeministic consciousness although ecofeminism did not come into existence in the era when she created this work. By analyzing the main characters the Ramsay couple and Lily Briscoe, this paper aims to interpret the ecofeminism reflected in this novel. Mr. Ramsay always ignores natural law, making no further progress in his career; Mrs. Ramsay enjoys the beauty of nature, making people around her happy and pleased; Lily alienates herself from nature, feeling puzzled about her painting. In terms of ecofeministic relationship between men and women, the differences in the values of the Ramsay couple result in the breaking up of their emotion, which stimulates Mr. Ramsay to accept some of the views of females; the reconciliation of Lily and Mr. Ramsay leads to their increasingly harmonious relation, which helps Lily achieve an ultimate completion of her painting. With her unique writing style, Virginia Woolf conveys to her readers the importance of achieving harmony between humans and nature and equality between men and women.},
     year = {2020}
    }
    

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    JF  - International Journal of Literature and Arts
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    AB  - Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece, To the Lighthouse, fully presents readers with her ecofeministic consciousness although ecofeminism did not come into existence in the era when she created this work. By analyzing the main characters the Ramsay couple and Lily Briscoe, this paper aims to interpret the ecofeminism reflected in this novel. Mr. Ramsay always ignores natural law, making no further progress in his career; Mrs. Ramsay enjoys the beauty of nature, making people around her happy and pleased; Lily alienates herself from nature, feeling puzzled about her painting. In terms of ecofeministic relationship between men and women, the differences in the values of the Ramsay couple result in the breaking up of their emotion, which stimulates Mr. Ramsay to accept some of the views of females; the reconciliation of Lily and Mr. Ramsay leads to their increasingly harmonious relation, which helps Lily achieve an ultimate completion of her painting. With her unique writing style, Virginia Woolf conveys to her readers the importance of achieving harmony between humans and nature and equality between men and women.
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Author Information
  • School of Foreign Languages, Nanjing XiaoZhuang University, Nanjing, China

  • School of Foreign Languages, Nanjing XiaoZhuang University, Nanjing, China

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