- Paperback: 304 pages
- Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks; New edition edition (4 Jun 1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0192838121
- ISBN-13: 978-0192838124
- Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 12.8 x 1.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 849,417 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Waves (Vintage Classics)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Review
Full of sensuous touches...the sounds of her words can be velvet on the page (Maggie Gee Daily Telegraph )
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
Book Description
'Virginia Woolf wanted to write about the vast unknown uncertain continent that is the world and us in it' Jeanette Winterson, from her introduction to The Waves
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Inside This Book
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
45 of 48 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
In my view this is Woolf's best book. It is less of a novel as one usually expects - more a 300-page poem in prose form. The key to reading the book is to simply let the words flow over you - don't try to decipher the literal meaning of every sentence, just enjoy the sensations that their shape and texture give you. Ostensibly about the lives of five friends from birth to death, the book can actually be interpreted as an attempt by Woolf to delve deep into various facets of her own psyche, and a sharp reader will doubtless notice many of their own deepest psychological experiences in there.
A word of warning - don't try it if you've never read Woolf before. This is Woolf at her most abstract and esoteric. Try Mrs. Dalloway or Orlando first to get used to her style, then perhaps To The Lighthouse, before you try this. But for those who read the book with the right approach, the rewards are enormous, and indeed potentially life-changing.
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This novel must invent its own narrative form to speak, and does; Woolf perfects her own poetics through the voices of six characters as we follow them from infancy to death, all in the course of a day. But the novel is not merely a formal or stylistic exercise in describing the world: it is one of the twentieth century's most moving accounts of the mostly unspoken, largely unspeakable shock at there being a world at all.
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf?
She was an author I had put off reading for some time now, for reasons I'm not sure I fully understand, but having finally got around to reading her once, I'm looking forward to a second chance.
For the first time in a long time, I have found myself shocked by a book. By the style as well as the substance. I remember an old friend describing the first time he heard 'Sunshine of your love' by Cream in the sixties and how he thought 'I didn't know you could do that, make that sound with a guitar'. Reading this book shocked me out of the complacency of what a novel could be or achieve.
In a stream of consciousness narrative, echoing the tide's waxing and waning over a single day, the novel follows the life of six friends from childhood to old age. It's a novel of feeling and sound, emotive more than cognitive. Poignant, halcyonic, melancholic - like it's author. A wonderful poetic gift that needs to be felt. A book to return to again and again.
She was an author I had put off reading for some time now, for reasons I'm not sure I fully understand, but having finally got around to reading her once, I'm looking forward to a second chance.
For the first time in a long time, I have found myself shocked by a book. By the style as well as the substance. I remember an old friend describing the first time he heard 'Sunshine of your love' by Cream in the sixties and how he thought 'I didn't know you could do that, make that sound with a guitar'. Reading this book shocked me out of the complacency of what a novel could be or achieve.
In a stream of consciousness narrative, echoing the tide's waxing and waning over a single day, the novel follows the life of six friends from childhood to old age. It's a novel of feeling and sound, emotive more than cognitive. Poignant, halcyonic, melancholic - like it's author. A wonderful poetic gift that needs to be felt. A book to return to again and again.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
the waves
I was delighted to receive this copy of The Waves. The quality was excellent and it arrived punctually.
I will have pleasure reading it.
Thanks
Jenny
I will have pleasure reading it.
Thanks
Jenny
Published 4 months ago by Mrs. Jennifer M. Dunbar
Woolf - The Waves - Wordsworth
The Waves (Wordsworth Classics)
Book is exactly as expected. BUT problem with it was that without any 'ill-treatment', the first 10 pages of the book disintegrated and... Read more
Book is exactly as expected. BUT problem with it was that without any 'ill-treatment', the first 10 pages of the book disintegrated and... Read more
Published 10 months ago by J. Garley
made a great birthday present
this is a great book that i would recommend to anyone who wants something a bit different. a bit difficult to get into but that doesn't stop it being a classic.
Published 16 months ago by Caleb
Waves of Nausea
You probably love or hate Virginia Woolf. Unfortunately, I found myself hating her. I have no doubt the commited will be outraged and point out that Woolf's style is deliberately... Read more
Published 19 months ago by Silvanus
A book to be read out loud
The Waves follows the lives of six friends from childhood to adulthood. There is no dialogue, but we follow the innermost thought of each of the characters. Read more
Published on 30 April 2009 by Marco Colombo
One of the Best Books I've Ever Read
Possibly one of the best books I've ever read. This is writing at its most skilled, incorporating excellent ideas about life, death and being. Read more
Published on 20 Mar 2009 by I. M. Knight
Stream of consciousness
The Waves is a stream of consciousness describing thoughts of a group of schoolmates throughout their lives. Read more
Published on 15 Jan 2009 by Jitkat
minor genius
I used to love the work of woolf but sadly recently i have begun to find her quite irritating. This is without doubt her best book, it is a perfect little prism-a delicacy. Read more
Published on 6 Jan 2005 by Mr. R. A. Allwright
cutting and revolutionary
This is the first virginia woolf book that I have had the fortune to read, and I must comment that I was blown away by it's fantastically original style. Read more
Published on 6 Nov 2002 by Mr. Nicholas Davies
Virginias stunning voyage of selfdiscovery in a sea of faces
Leaving all else aside, this view into the creative mind of genius is tinged with the desperation of a mad woman coping with high brow society at the turn of the century, fighting... Read more
Published on 2 April 2001
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