To the Lighthouse (1927), a novel by Virginia Woolf, has a section called ‘Time Passes,’ that describes the events of ten years in twenty pages. Perhaps the writers of the BBC’s adaptation of Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy (1993) might have looked to her for hints on time management, in order to fit its 1,400 pages or so into six hour-long episodes. To the Lighthouse might also be called a study in the intensity of perception; they matter more than traditional parametres of plot and character arcs.
