First published in 1915, The Voyage Out marked the literary debut of one of the great pioneers of the modern novel. Virginia Woolf's extraordinary debut follows a group of lively, eccentric British tourists embarking on a sea voyage from London to South America. Among them is Rachel Vinrace, a shy, motherless young lady who has been taken along under the wing of her aunt Helen that she may learn "how to live".

The narrative shifts focus between its heroine and the peripheral characters with their chorus of viewpoints. For Rachel, the voyage becomes a journey toward intellectual and emotional maturity. Arriving in Santa Marina, a village on the South American coast, Rachel is introduced to a group of English expatriates, among them the sensitive young Terence Hewet, an aspiring writer with whom she falls into a doomed romance.