Jacob's Room (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin)
Jacob's Room (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin) book cover

Jacob's Room (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin)

Paperback – February 1, 1998

Price
$11.94
Format
Paperback
Pages
240
Publisher
Penguin Classics
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0140185706
Dimensions
5.09 x 0.54 x 7.79 inches
Weight
6.3 ounces

Description

Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) is now recognized as a major twentieth-century author, a great novelist and essayist and a key figure in literary history as a feminist and a modernist. Her first novel, The Voyage Out , appeared in 1915, and she then worked through the transitional Night and Day (1919) to the highly experimental and impressionistic Jacob's Room (1922). Her major novels include Mrs Dalloway (1925), Orlando (1928), The Waves (1931), The Years (1937), and Between the Acts (1941).

Features & Highlights

  • Jacob Flanders is a young man passing from adolescence to adulthood in a hazy rite of passage. From his boyhood on the windswept shores of Cornwall to his days as a student at Cambridge, his elusive, chameleon-like character is gradually revealed in a stream of loosely related incidents and impressions: whether through his mother's letters, his friend's conversations, or the thoughts of the women who adore him. Then we glimpse him as a young man, caught under the glare of a London streetlamp. It is 1914, he is twenty-six, and Europe is on the brink of war... This tantalizing novel heralded Woolf's bold departure from the traditional methods of the novel, with its experimental play between time and reality, memory and desire.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(84)
★★★★
20%
(56)
★★★
15%
(42)
★★
7%
(20)
28%
(78)

Most Helpful Reviews

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Simply Beautiful

This IS literature at its best. There is nothing I can say that hasn't already been said rather eloquently by the first review of this book, 'Stitched Seams of Color, Subjectless, and Brilliant,' January 17, 1998 Reviewer: A reader from Deerfield, Massachusetts, so go read that one. The other reviews were too superficial; futile exercises in trying to describe a plot that is not there. Woolf is remarkable. This novel is a reflection of Woolf.
5 people found this helpful
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Great read.

Beautiful insight into the mind, and characteristics of Jacob, who was modeled after her brother Thobey. This modernist novel portrays another aspect of WWI which is rarely seen.
2 people found this helpful
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Great read.

Beautiful insight into the mind, and characteristics of Jacob, who was modeled after her brother Thobey. This modernist novel portrays another aspect of WWI which is rarely seen.
2 people found this helpful
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Confusing and frustrating at times but Oh so good.

One of the more difficult novels to follow for Woolf, it still was an amazing read. Several times, I had to go back and forth to remind myself in places of what she mentioned earlier.

Virginia Woolf uses clocks and time in a consistent and almost rhythmic way in this book. I found it confounding but amusing and introspective of the characters.

From the very beginning, Woolf threw me in the middle of things as they happened and I found myself trying to scramble to figure out what the hell she was about. Yes, I loved it even though she made me work for it. Good book.
2 people found this helpful
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Well-written, but not for someone looking for a good story

Let me start off by saying that I read this book for a university class, and that I probably wouldn't have this book from front to back otherwise. That being said, after finishing it for the course, I think the book will appeal to some readers but seem like nonsense to others. Anyone looking for a straight-forward, clear story with a "traditional" literary storyline will be sorely dissappointed. The plot is really choppy and the "storyline" (if you can call it that) doesn't really matter.

Rather, the whole point of the book is it's prose, and Woolf's momentary glances on life and the smallest details of human living. It's also very dense, full of different narrators, and at many times difficult to follow and slow to get through. But some short moments contain brilliance. I might suggest choosing another Woolf novel to read, unless you're looking for a different type of beauty, in which case, choose this one.
2 people found this helpful