What is femininity? Should it be defined? The novel To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf, reveals the convention of gender and the struggle against it through the character of Lily Briscoe. Lily is an unmarried painter and a guest at the summer cottage of the Ramsays. Lily learns the traditional customs of femininity, which Mrs. Ramsay well exemplifies, and which the older woman associates with marriage and family. Lily, however, is both bewildered and troubled by these traditions and expectations.

At the beginning of the novel, Lily begins a portrait of Mrs. Ramsay. However, she finds it difficult to concentrate. Lily is trapped in her own anxiety as she doubts herself. She wants to become something, but she is also afraid that the statements of Charles Tansley, who has asserted that women can neither paint nor write, are correct. Lily worries about the fate of her work. She fears her work will be tossed aside and forgotten. Over the course of the novel, Lily undergoes a change that alters her personality. She overcomes the anxiety and fear she had at the beginning of the story. She becomes an artist with her own opinion and style. At the end of the novel, Lily finishes the painting that she started years ago as a remembrance of Mrs. Ramsay.