Faculty of philology department of english philology viktorija mi
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JOURNEY
Figure 7. Conceptual Metaphors of Time and Space in the Novel To the Lighthouse What is the essence of the figure? Indeed, as I have already stated in the previous chapters, the novel consists of three parts each of which centres around a particular semantic core, or idea that the whole novel can be treated like a symbolic metaphorical journey through human life and human mind. In general, it is possible to claim that in The Window, Woolf describes common daily family life; Time Passes convincingly deals with the passing time and its influence on human lives, whereas the last chapter, The Lighthouse seems to celebrate the power and meaning of art in life. Indeed, throughout the novel, we see the characters leading their lives that have a beginning and an end, as if travelling to their destination that is unique and specific for each person in the book. Therefore, I aimed to formulate the three conceptual metaphors characterizing the message of the novel on the basis of the aforementioned ideas, as seen in the figure. The metaphors can be worded as follows: life is a journey, time is a journey, and art is a journey. Adhering to several critics’ opinions, I would like to ground my choice of metaphors by analyzing them one by one. In my opinion, there is enough evidence to claim that the most important conceptual metaphor in the novel says that life is a journey. Indeed, it is possible to understand a journey as a search that has several temporal stages: the past period, or departure, the present situation, or passage of events, and the future perspective, or the idea of return. In the novel, these are the characters’ intentions, preparations, thoughts, and dreams to reach the lighthouse which in their wholeness create the whole novel as a contextual metaphor. I can adhere to Lakoff who believes (1987:308) that every journey is a dynamic process as it takes time, maybe even a whole life, and involves constant 85 moving from one position to another. I would complement this idea by adding that every journey is also a social event as travellers meet other people along the way; and this gives rise to new experiences, contacts, and relationships. Besides, a journey implies a transition to another world, facing tasks and trials, alone or with the help of others. Having survived various challenges and having acquired important knowledge, the person involved in a journey must then decide whether to go back with this experience to the ordinary world and to transfer it to others, which faces him again with new challenges and difficulties; although he knows for certain that this new knowledge will improve the world. To my mind, in the novel, all the characters can be treated as travellers who have their purposes, or destinations, and means of reaching them, or routes. Their journey covers both physical and metaphysical reality because they face obstacles both in their real lives (the cruelty of war, the complexity of human relationships) and in their mind (the disharmony between totally different human characters, their plans, and intentions, to mention but some of them). During their journey, the characters make important judgments, as it is necessary to choose friendship or alienation, love or hatred, hope or disillusionment. Indeed, these decisions can be described as certain symbolic crossroads in their journey, while their achievements and small victories serve as landmarks. For instance, it seems to me that Mrs. Ramsay is constantly searching for her lost self and thus travelling through her experiences that enable her to grow spiritually. The protagonist of the novel seeks to find the golden middle among her social roles (such as being a mother, a housewife, and a lady) and her inner wishes, as well as her seek for a better world where closer relationships among people filled with more warmth and sincerity would be possible. I believe that Mrs. Ramsay, who is the opposite of her practical and rational husband, reaches beyond the limitations of individual isolation in her efforts to care about other people: her children, her husband, friends and all the people she meets. Symbolically, we can call her the true lighthouse of the novel that provides warmth and light overall the family. Interestingly, this spiritual power and light continues to illuminate and connect the family members even after the protagonist’s death because all the memories related to Mrs. Ramsay’s personality enable other characters grow in their minds and become stronger. In my opinion, the second conceptual metaphor that unites the three chapters of the novel could be worded like this: time is a journey. Indeed, it seems to me that although physically the characters stay fixed in a limited scope of time and space, their consciousness moves freely in time: in the characters’ mind, everything happens in the present, which can extend to infinity or contract to a moment. This concept of inner time, which is irregular and disrupted with respect to the conventional conception of time, is preferred to the real physical external time, since it shows the relativism of a subjective experience. Indeed, I admire the way Woolf discloses the private thoughts 86 of her characters in her novels and would like to claim that her innovative narrative and stream of consciousness technique both enables her to move easily from one character to the next and allows her reader to have a curious insight into each character’s mind. In addition, Woolf’s narrative leaves one mind and enters another, travelling between the interior worlds of the characters. Thus, if we support the belief that human consciousness transcends the limitations of individual minds, it will be natural and reasonable to treat the whole temporal surroundings as a metaphorical journey from the past to the future. As mentioned in the subchapter The Temporal Perspective of Themes and Download 0.71 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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