  Modernist novels are thought to break with traditional plot structure. In
this paper, we test this theory by applying Sentiment Analysis to one of the
most famous modernist novels, To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. We first
assess Sentiment Analysis in light of the critique that it cannot adequately
account for literary language: we use a unique statistical comparison to
demonstrate that even simple lexical approaches to Sentiment Analysis are
surprisingly effective. We then use the Syuzhet.R package to explore
similarities and differences across modeling methods. This comparative
approach, when paired with literary close reading, can offer interpretive
clues. To our knowledge, we are the first to undertake a hybrid model that
fully leverages the strengths of both computational analysis and close reading.
This hybrid model raises new questions for the literary critic, such as how to
interpret relative versus absolute emotional valence and how to take into
account subjective identification. Our finding is that while To the Lighthouse
does not replicate a plot centered around a traditional hero, it does reveal an
underlying emotional structure distributed between characters - what we term a
distributed heroine model. This finding is innovative in the field of modernist
and narrative studies and demonstrates that a hybrid method can yield
significant discoveries.
