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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
60 of 61 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Well Worth It,
By M (USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Jacob's Room (Dover Thrift Editions) (Paperback)
This is the first Virginia Woolf book I've read and I can see why she is ranked as a great writer. Her writing is very dense and the prose reads like poetry. She writes Jacob's Room in the stream of consciousness style, like Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce. The stream tends to meander all over the lot, so just go with the flow. The reader hears snippets of conversation and characters come and go. We learn about Jacob Flanders, but in little bits, here and there, the way you learn about people in real life. The reader never knows what's going on inside Jacob's head. You observe Jacob the way you would in real life: from the outside. Size him up for yourself. The novel is set around World War I and Jacob Flanders (FLANDERS, as in Flanders' Field--World War I's killing field) is one of that Lost Generation. The novel is dark, questioning the futility of life, but the language is beautiful and the emotion is stabbingly true. Definitely read it, but have something more chipper around to read afterward, lest you brood too much.
24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Woolf's first experimental novel,
This review is from: Jacob's Room (Paperback)
_Jacob's Room_ marks Virginia Woolf first truly experimental novel. It follows the elusive figure of Jacob Flanders, from his boyhood to college and finally off to the Great War.It is a novel where plot and typical "defining" events are irrelevant. This is not a story about who dies, who lives, who loves, or who hates. This is a novel about interiority, about the effect Jacob has on those he meets. It is interesting to note that the character of Jacob Flanders was (in part) based upon Virginia Woolf's own brother, Thoby Stephen, who died quite young. While it is dangerous to overread the connection between Jacob and Thoby, it's highly probably that part of the novel's elegaic tone comes from it. Woolf's prose is typically lyrical, and she depends heavily upon interior monologue and stream-of-consciousness writing. It's not an easy novel to read, especially Woolf novices, but I think fans of modern fiction will find the experience worthwhile. Better introductions to Woolf's works are _Mrs. Dalloway_ and _To the Lighthouse_.
19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
9,
By A Customer
This review is from: Jacob's Room (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin) (Paperback)
Virginia Woolf is one of my favorite authors and Jacob's Room is my second favortie Woolf book (The Waves being the first).Jacob's Room is the highly impressionistic story of Jacob Flanders, a character based on Woolf's own brother. This is a coming-of-age story as we follow Jacob from the rocky coasts of Cornwall to the sun-drenched shores of Greece. Anyone looking for a conventional story or plot won't find it here. Jacob's Room is Virginia Woolf during a highly experimental stage; a stage during which she was developing her pure stream-of-consciousness style. Jacob's Room is for very "literary" readers. This is definitely not light and fluffy and it's definitely not going to be everyone's cup of tea. Those who love good literature, however, will find Jacob's Room a pure poetic masterpiece of the highest order.
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