The Turn of the Screw

By Henry James

The greatest ghost story in the English language, Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw is a hauntingly atmospheric tale of supernatural events.

A young governess takes over the charge of two orphaned siblings, Miles and Flora, in a large, isolated country house. Unguided and almost entirely alone, the governess attempts to bring normality and joy into the children’s lives but quickly comes to believe that something sinister is threatening her new charges. Is an intruder lurking within the house’s grounds or could a more malevolent, ghostly force be behind the terrifying events at Bly Manor?

Originally published in 1898, The Turn of the Screw remains an excellent exploration of human psychology and is known as a masterful example of the written ghost story. This spine-chilling novella is perfect for fans of classic horror fiction, or those with an interest in the work of Henry James.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fantasy and Horror Classics
• Release date: Jan 6, 2020
• ISBN: 9781528789240

Henry James

Henry James (1843-1916) was an American author of novels, short stories, plays, and non-fiction. He spent most of his life in Europe, and much of his work regards the interactions and complexities between American and European characters. Among his works in this vein are The Portrait of a Lady (1881), The Bostonians (1886), and The Ambassadors (1903). Through his influence, James ushered in the era of American realism in literature. In his lifetime he wrote 12 plays, 112 short stories, 20 novels, and many travel and critical works. He was nominated three times for the Noble Prize in Literature.

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THE TURN

OF THE SCREW

By

HENRY JAMES

First published in 1898

Copyright © 2019 Fantasy and Horror Classics

This edition is published by Fantasy and Horror Classics,

an imprint of Read Books Ltd.

This book is copyright and may not be reproduced or copied in any

way without the express permission of the publisher in writing.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available

from the British Library.

www.readandcobooks.co.uk

Contents

Henry James

THE TURN OF THE SCREW

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Henry James

Henry James was born in New York City in 1843. One of thirteen children, James had an unorthodox early education, switching between schools, private tutors and private reading. In 1855, the James family embarked on a three year-long trip to Geneva, London, and Paris; an experience that greatly influenced his decision, some years later, to emigrate to Europe. Having returned to America, and having met prominent authors and thinkers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, James turned seriously to writing.

James published his first story, ‘A Tragedy of Error’, in the Continental Monthly in 1864, when he was twenty years old. In 1876, he emigrated to London, where he remained for the vast majority of the rest of his life, becoming a British citizen in 1915. From this point on, he was a hugely prolific author, eventually producing twenty novels and more than a hundred short stories and novellas, as well as literary criticism, plays and travelogues. Amongst James's most famous works are The Europeans (1878), Daisy Miller (1878), Washington Square (1880), The Bostonians (1886), and one of the most famous ghost stories of all time, The Turn of the Screw (1898). James’ personal favourite, of all his works, was the 1903 novel The Ambassadors. He is regarded by modern-day critics as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism, and one of the greatest American authors of all-time.

James’ autobiography appeared in three volumes between 1914 and 1917. He died following a stroke in February of 1916, aged 72.

THE TURN OF THE SCREW

The story had held us, round the fire, sufficiently breathless, but except the obvious remark that it was gruesome, as, on Christmas Eve in an old house, a strange tale should essentially be, I remember no comment uttered till somebody happened to say that it was the only case he had met in which such a visitation had fallen on a child. The case, I may mention, was that of an apparition in just such an old house as had gathered us for the occasion—an appearance, of a dreadful kind, to a little boy sleeping in the room with his mother and waking her up in the terror of it; waking her not to dissipate his dread and soothe him to sleep again, but to encounter also, herself, before she had succeeded in doing so, the same sight that had shaken him. It was this observation that drew from Douglas—not immediately, but later in the evening—a reply that had the interesting consequence to which I call attention. Someone else told a story not particularly effective, which I saw he was not following. This I took for a sign that he had himself something to produce and that we should only have to wait. We waited in fact till two nights later; but that same evening, before we scattered, he brought out what was in his mind.

"I quite agree—in regard to Griffin’s ghost, or whatever it was—that its appearing first to the little boy, at so tender an age, adds a particular touch. But it’s not the first occurrence of its charming kind that I know to have involved a child. If the child gives the effect another turn of the screw, what do you say to two children—?"

We say, of course, somebody exclaimed, that they give two turns! Also that we want to hear about them.

I can see Douglas there before the fire, to which he had got up to present his back, looking down at his interlocutor with his hands in his pockets. Nobody but me, till now, has ever heard. It’s quite too horrible. This, naturally, was declared by several voices to give the thing the utmost price, and our friend, with quiet art, prepared his triumph by turning his eyes over the rest of us and going on: It’s beyond everything. Nothing at all that I know touches it.

For sheer terror? I remember asking.

He seemed to say it was not so simple as that; to be really at a loss how to qualify it. He passed his hand over his eyes, made a little wincing grimace. For dreadful—dreadfulness!

Oh, how delicious! cried one of the women.

He took no notice of her; he looked at me, but as if, instead of me, he saw what he spoke of. For general uncanny ugliness and horror and pain.

Well then, I said, just sit right down and begin.

He turned round to the fire, gave a kick to a log, watched it an instant. Then as he faced us again: I can’t begin. I shall have to send to town. There was a unanimous groan at this, and much reproach; after which, in his preoccupied way, he explained. The story’s written. It’s in a locked drawer—it has not been out for years. I could write to my man and enclose the key; he could send down the packet as he finds it. It was to me in particular that he appeared to propound this—appeared almost to appeal for aid not to hesitate. He had broken a thickness of ice, the formation of many a winter; had had his reasons for a long silence. The others resented postponement, but it was just his scruples that charmed me. I adjured him to write by the first post and to agree with us for an early hearing; then I asked him if the experience in question had been his own. To this his answer was prompt. Oh, thank God, no!

And is the record yours? You took the thing down?

"Nothing but the impression. I took that here—he tapped his heart. I’ve never lost it."

Then your manuscript—?

Is in old, faded ink, and in the most beautiful hand. He hung fire again. A woman’s. She has been dead these twenty years. She sent me the pages in question before she died. They were all listening now, and of course there was somebody to be arch, or at any rate to draw the inference. But if he put the inference by without a smile it was also without irritation. She was a most charming person, but she was ten years older than I. She was my sister’s governess, he quietly said. She was the most agreeable woman I’ve ever known in her position; she would have been worthy of any whatever. It was long ago, and this episode was long before. I was at Trinity, and I found her at home on my coming down the second summer. I was much there that year—it was a beautiful one; and we had, in her off-hours, some strolls and talks in the garden—talks in which she struck me as awfully clever and nice. Oh yes; don’t grin: I liked her extremely and am glad to this day to think she liked me, too. If she hadn’t she wouldn’t have told me. She had never told anyone. It wasn’t simply that she said so, but that I knew she hadn’t. I was sure; I could see. You’ll easily judge why when you hear.

Because the thing had been such a scare?

He continued to fix me. You’ll easily judge, he repeated: "you will."

I fixed him, too. I see. She was in love.

He laughed for the first time. "You are acute. Yes, she was in love. That is, she had been. That came out—she couldn’t tell her story without its coming out. I saw it, and she saw I saw it; but neither of us spoke of it. I remember the time and the place—the corner of the lawn, the shade of the great beeches and the long, hot summer afternoon. It wasn’t a scene for a shudder; but oh—!" He quitted the fire and dropped back into his chair.

You’ll receive the packet Thursday morning? I inquired.

Probably not till the second post.

Well then; after dinner—

You’ll all meet me here? He looked us round again. Isn’t anybody going? It was almost the tone of hope.

Everybody will stay!

"I will—and I will! cried the ladies whose departure had been fixed. Mrs. Griffin, however, expressed the need for a little more light. Who was it she was in love with?"

The story will tell, I took upon myself to reply.

Oh, I can’t wait for the story!

"The story won’t tell, said Douglas; not in any literal, vulgar way."

More’s the pity, then. That’s the only way I ever understand.

"Won’t you tell, Douglas?" somebody else inquired.

He sprang to his feet again. Yes—tomorrow. Now I must go to bed. Good night. And quickly catching up a candlestick, he left us slightly bewildered. From our end of the great brown hall we heard his step on the stair; whereupon Mrs. Griffin spoke. "Well, if I don’t know who she was in love with, I know who he was."

She was ten years older, said her husband.

"Raison de plus—at that age! But it’s rather nice, his long reticence."

Forty years! Griffin put in.

With this outbreak at last.

The outbreak, I returned, will make a tremendous occasion of Thursday night; and everyone so agreed with me that, in the light of it, we lost all attention for everything else. The last story, however incomplete and like the mere opening of a serial, had been told; we handshook and candlestuck, as somebody said, and went to bed.

I knew the next day that a letter containing the key had, by the first post, gone off to his London apartments; but in spite of—or perhaps just on account of—the eventual diffusion of this knowledge we quite let him alone till after dinner, till such an hour of the evening, in fact, as might best accord with the kind of emotion on which our hopes were fixed. Then he became as communicative as we could desire and indeed gave us his best reason for being so. We had it from him again before the fire in the hall, as we had had our mild wonders of the previous night. It appeared that the narrative he had promised to read us really required for a proper intelligence a few words of prologue. Let me say here distinctly, to have done with it, that this narrative, from an exact transcript of my own made much later, is what I shall presently give. Poor Douglas, before his death—when it was in sight—committed to me the manuscript that reached him on the third of these days and that, on the same spot, with immense effect, he began to read to our hushed little circle on the night of the fourth. The departing ladies who had said they would stay didn’t, of course, thank heaven, stay: they departed, in consequence of arrangements made, in a rage of curiosity, as they professed, produced by the touches with which he had already worked us up. But that only made his little final auditory more compact and select, kept it, round the hearth, subject to a common thrill.

The first of these touches conveyed that the written statement took up the tale at a point after it had, in a manner, begun. The fact to be in possession of was therefore that his old friend, the youngest of several daughters of a poor country parson, had, at the age of twenty, on taking service for the first time in the schoolroom, come up to London, in trepidation, to answer in person an advertisement that had already placed her in brief correspondence with the advertiser. This person proved, on her presenting herself, for judgment, at a house in Harley Street, that impressed her as vast and imposing—this prospective patron proved a gentleman, a bachelor in the prime of life, such a figure as had never risen, save in a dream or an old novel, before a fluttered, anxious girl out of a Hampshire vicarage. One could easily fix his type; it never, happily,

Reviews for The Turn of the Screw

[charrlygirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Narrated by Emma Thompson, I enjoyed re-reading this classic, gothic novella for the third time.

I know many readers are not impressed by this book, but I enjoyed it, (again). I know it's rather verbose, especially considering the length of the book, but I found more than a few of the sentences to be outright chilling.

I've always loved psychological horror and ambiguous stories, so this one hits most of the marks for me. My original rating of the book, at 4 stars, stands.

[zumbanista · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Disappointed after hearing all the praise of this novella, possibly was more shocking in its day and I’ve now become jaded by ghost stories. Lots of gothic atmosphere, tension and uncertainty. While the language wasn’t all that difficult, the style and manner of writing made it a bit difficult to get through. Long sentences with many clauses served to confuse me and lose the gist at times. Not really an enjoyable read so it felt longer and I was glad when it ended. Can’t recommend, but glad I filled in the gap of my reading of classic literature.

[tess_w · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James is billed as a psychological thriller. It is the story of an unnamed governess who agrees to care for two children at their uncle's estate, Bly. Her story is told through her journal entries. Her charges are "darlings" until one day while walking she meets menacing apparitions. I wanted to love this book as I do the classics. However, the writing was convoluted and this reader was very much distanced from the characters and felt like a passive bystander. It's saving grace was that is was only 131 pages. 2 1/2 stars

[williemeikle-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Another genre classic that I hadn't read for a long time-and this time with good reason. James' way with a convoluted sentence often makes me want to scream, and having to backtrack to work out his intended focus does not make for a smooth flow in reading experience.

That said, there is a definite power in this tale, and it builds nicely in dread and atmosphere to a chilling conclusion. It is definitely a classic of the genre, but the movie THE INNOCENTS showed how it could have been done in a more straightforward, yet still distinctly superior, fashion, and Peter Straub's retelling in GHOST STORY is also a superior version.

Could easily have been a 5 star tale, and saying that, I've nudged it up from 3 to 4 this time around. It could be a long, long time before I want to read it again though.

[bettesbooks · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

A ghost story with a horrific overtone.Victorian obscurity in expression, so not to say anything that could be objectionable. Took me a while to figure out what was worrying the governess.220

[beckymmoe_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I have no freaking idea what I just read. It ended--if you can even call that an ending, which is up for debate--and I went back and re-read the last six chapters. It didn't really help.W.T.F????2 stars for a strong start and a cool story idea...he lost me after that.

[ssimon2000-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not much to say about this one. It had great potential to be a really creepy Halloween tale, but just fell flat for me.

The writing was very good and typical of the writing in the late 1800s.

[tess_schoolmarm · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James is billed as a psychological thriller. It is the story of an unnamed governess who agrees to care for two children at their uncle's estate, Bly. Her story is told through her journal entries. Her charges are "darlings" until one day while walking she meets menacing apparitions. I wanted to love this book as I do the classics. However, the writing was convoluted and this reader was very much distanced from the characters and felt like a passive bystander. It's saving grace was that is was only 131 pages. 2 1/2 stars

[msaucier818 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was my first Henry James story and I really enjoyed it. It was a short novel that can be characterized as a classic psychological thriller or ghost story from the 19th century. The story itself was not particularly scary, but I really enjoyed James' writing style and how he got inside the head of the main character as she starts to lose it later in the story. I will certainly read more of Henry James.

[arkrayder · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I found this a tedious read. Nothing really happens, except perhaps at the very end. The story seems to revolve around the governess trying to find out why Miles, one of her charges, has been expelled from school and the appearance of ghosts which might and might not be real. Best to have read a few of Henry James’s better writings before this.

[bookconcierge · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Audiobook performed by Simon Vance and Vanessa BenjaminA ghost story and psychological thriller. A young woman is hired to be governess to two young children, Miles and Flora. They are the wards of “the master,” their uncle, who has taken on their guardianship after their parents died in India. He is unmarried and really not interested in the children or the running of the household. In fact, after hiring the governess he tells her to simply deal with whatever comes up and not to bother him at all. James begins the tale with a gathering of friends at Christmas. They begin telling ghost stories, and eventually one of them mentions the document he received from a young woman (she is never named). He then begins to read the tale. This opening puzzles me, because James never returns to this gathering of friends. The rest of the novel is devoted to the governess’s manuscript / notes on what happened. Having arrived at the mansion, she is charmed by the angelic Flora, enjoying their lessons and spending time with her. She also befriends the housekeeper, Mrs Grose, who answers some of her questions about the previous governess, Miss Jessel. Things begin to go badly quickly however. A strange figure is seen in one of the mansion’s towers. Miles returns from school, presumably for holiday, but in reality has been expelled without explanation. The governess is certain that some malevolent entity is intent on capturing the children in her care, and she is determined to prevent it from doing so. All the uncertainty and secrecy serve to increase the emotional tension in the story. It is dark, and puzzling, and disturbing. I am not a fan of the ending, which seems abrupt and unexplained. But then, a good ghost story SHOULD leave us wondering. The audiobook is performed by Simon Vance, who voices the introduction, and Vanessa Benjamin who narrates the governess’s manuscript. They are both accomplished voice actors and do a marvelous job with James’ work.

[lycomayflower · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I honestly don't remember much about this now? It was neither as impressive nor as unimpressive as I have heard. Fairly atmospheric, decent ambiguous ending. I'm glad I read it, if only because now I will get it when other books or movies are referencing it.

[drapple_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I had never gotten around to reading this classic ghost story and it seemed appropriate for the pre-Halloween season. I am sure it was shocking in its time, but compared to Stephen King or Dean Koontz it's pretty tame.

[moniquesnyman-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Chilling! That ending is utterly chilling!

[browner56 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

At Bly, a country estate in 19th century England, a young woman is hired as a governess for two young children who have been recently orphaned after the death of their parents. The home belongs to the children’s uncle who, although their legal guardian, wants nothing to do with them. At first, all is seemingly well, as the governess is thoroughly charmed with the beauty, intelligence, and disposition of her charges. Soon enough, though, things take a serious turn for the worse when she begins to see the ghosts of two former employees of the estate who seem to have malicious intentions toward the children. But are these apparitions real and, if so, why is the governess the only one who can see them? Alternatively, is she slowly descending into madness, or afflicted by some other malady? What are the secrets that the children seem to be protecting? How does the uncle’s apparent indifference factor into the situation? What explains the ultimate fates that the children and the governess experience?Those are all excellent questions. Of course, one of the things that has kept The Turn of the Screw relevant fiction for more than a century is that Henry James never really answers any of them. Instead, he offers a psychologically complex gothic horror story that allows readers to decide—or at least try to—for themselves what actually happens. Certainly, the author’s innovations in this tale were hugely influential on many subsequent artists; over the years, the novella has inspired works in literature, film, theater, and even opera. What the book is not, unfortunately, is a particularly interesting or compelling narrative in the modern context. James wrote with a bloated, overly wordy style that severely minimized the impact of the suspense in the tale. Although described by some critics as “chillingly evil” and “sinister,” I found the story to fall well short of those marks, with the horrific elements often buried in long passages of verbose inner monologue from a very unreliable narrator. So, while I am glad to have read the book for its historical importance, it was not one that I especially enjoyed.

[cecrow · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

At the start I was having 'Jane Eyre' flashbacks - a governess, a pleasant young girl as her charge, a housekeeper for her primary company, a love interest in the handsome but absent landowner, an isolated manor in the English countryside. Henry James knows this; he is winking at us when the narrator begins to wonder whether there could be "an insane, an unmentionable relative kept in unsuspected confinement?" In short order though (and with benefit of the prologue), this tale resolves into a ghost story rather than a romance. The author aimed to build suspense through that prologue's promise of a horrific tale to follow, etc. Maybe this worked at the time but now it leads to false expectations of something schlocky. Encountering an unexplained stranger in my own house at the dead of the night would be deeply chilling, even more so if it had a mysterious influence on my children; but today's reader of modern horror is spoiled by the likes of Stephen King’s in-your-face approach. TotS's relatively mild scenes won’t incite the same horror ... unless you read slowly, absorbing every turn of the narrator's thoughts, placing yourself in her shoes and opening your mind to its widest expanse of empathy for her. Then you can still find at least a wisp of its carefully crafted spell.Henry James has a style all his own that I admire, but it does require an extra level of patience. I've long confused this work with 'The Taming of the Shrew' for being similarly named, but now that I've read one I think I can keep them straight.

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Turn of the Screw may be the first entry in the very specific sub-genre of the ambiguous ghost story, a sub-genre with includes the much better The Haunting of Hill House and The Little Stranger. Here, an unnamed governess takes on a suspicious job caring for two orphans on a remote estate. Her employer, the children's uncle, leaves specific instructions not to trouble him with any decisions, so she is basically on her own. Once the governess arrives at the house, she soon starts seeing apparitions, whom she identifies as the ghosts of the previous governess and her employer's valet, both of whom died under mysterious circumstances. She perceives that the children know of the ghosts and determines that the four of them have some sinister relationship.The governess's account is suspect for many reasons. For one, she describes her charges as beautiful, perfect, angelic creatures, praises which they clearly don't deserve; in fact, they are hardly characters in their own right, and seem merely to exist for the governess to lavish unwarranted praise upon. Clearly, she is subject to emotional excesses, as she has accepted this ludicrous position and developed a bizarre crush on her employer with absolutely no prompting. Finally, no one seems to see these "ghosts" but her, and the reader has no proof that the children are aware of them other than her say-so.Henry James would rather not write a simple, straightforward sentence if he could compose one that twists and turns and wanders off to nowhere instead -- or perhaps this is yet another example of the governess/narrator's instability. It's a short book, though, so the overwrought writing style is bearable. The ending, however, comes across as melodramatic to a 21st-century reader. Still, The Turn of the Screw is worth reading for its part in developing this unique sub-genre, which marries the haunting of houses and the haunting of minds.

[veilofisis · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Turn of the Screw is probably the most widely-analyzed piece of literature to come out of the 1890s (and certainly the most widely-analyzed of Victorian-era horror fictions). Its plot concerns nothing spectacularly unique, as far as ghost stories go; and yet this, James’ most consummate novel, is one of the more ingeniously constructed ghost stories in the English language. The Turn of the Screw’s greatest strength lies in its exploration of the complex web of doubts that linger in the back of its central character’s brain, which mirror in many ways the reservations that occur in the mind of a reader of ghost stories. This curious inversion of the relationship between reader and writer sets the stage for a matryoshka doll of a story that falls into itself, layer upon layer, numerous times throughout its scant hundred pages of text.The Turn of the Screw is almost a condensation of every motif present in the archetypal English ghost story, though its scope is more American in its convolutions. Henry James, who penned several other ghostly tales alongside his more mainstream fiction, succeeds here so supremely because of his near-obsession with the ambiguity of ambiguities. Wilde called it ‘a most wonderful, lurid, poisonous little tale,’ and that is a fitting assessment: The Turn of the Screw envelops us in a fog of doubt and suspicion, placing us in its narrator’s head and forcing us to see mysterious events through her eyes: there is no third-person narration here to challenge our inevitable disbelief; instead we must rely on the facts as presented by a narrator who is, quite possibly, delusional…but then, is she?The plot concerns the isolation of a governess at a sprawling country estate where she is left in charge of two children who seem to have fallen under the influence of a menace that may or may not be supernatural. As the story evolves, however, we are forced to question how much of what our narrator is telling us is accurate; The Turn of the Screw predates, and yet also exemplifies, the idea of the ‘unreliable narrator’ which was to have such an influence on the Moderns. Its subject matter lends itself, however, to this device and it remains one of the more successful examples of the technique. The Turn of the Screw is quite possibly the death rattle of literary Gothicism—the final ‘key work’ in a century-long movement—and so it is quite fitting that it so encapsulates the entire tradition of the Gothic. There would be later luminaries—Lovecraft, Blackwood, Du Maurier, and others—as the 20th Century began to find its darker voice, but The Turn of the Screw remains the curtain call of Gothicism proper: it is the beginning of the psychological horror story and the end of the ‘haunted castle,’ ‘perambulating skeleton,’ ‘woman-in-peril’ school. It still fascinates, simply because so much can be read into it. If we grant that its conclusions remain open-ended, we must also grant, however, that a great deal of its import is right there in black-and-white: The Turn of the Screw elucidates as much as it obscures and paves the way for the kind of cerebral terror that would become the hallmark of the next era of literary gloom: the Weird Tale. Like all fictions that occupy a place of transition, The Turn of the Screw is a very difficult piece to pin down or define, and given its subject matter, this ambiguity seems entirely relevant to any assessment of its impact. James may not be the foremost writer of Victorian-era Gothic, but his opus is without question one of the finest examples of the movement: it is crisper than Stoker and more chilling than Le Fanu or Stevenson, more allied with Poe and hence more American in its focus: James may have been an Anglophile of the strictest sort, but his darkest work, The Turn of the Screw, entirely exemplifies the principles of the American Gothic and remains, with the stories of Poe, the strongest work in its canon.

[well7readneck · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Read with Shutter Island.

[jawalter · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

eBook

Reading The Turn of the Screw is like few other reading experiences I've ever had. It's perhaps most similar to Faulkner's unwillingness to explicitly explore the trauma driving his characters, but taken to an extreme far beyond that. Does James truly know what is happening in the story? Perhaps, but given that the governess, despite her overwhelming certainty in her own beliefs, is one of literature's least-trustworthy narrators, it is impossible for any reader to have total certainty about any part of her story.

It's her certainty, paradoxically, that makes the governess such a compelling character. Presented with events she doesn't fully comprehend, she leaps to conclusions with a startling suddenness, and once adopted, treats those conclusions as absolute facts. It is, in fact, her certainty that leads to so much doubt on the part of the reader, even as it is responsible for the creation of the story itself. Clearly, the story as written, whether true or not, is the governess' creation. Throughout, she fills in every narrative gap, cutting off the statements of others so as to complete their statements herself, or painting in vivid terms the motivations and imaginings of characters that would otherwise have remained hidden. As readers, we're not allowed our own suppositions about the other characters or the events of the story. The governess tells us what they say, think, believe, and do, leaving us only a binary option, befitting greatly the way her own mind works: do we believe her or not?

No matter our efforts, we can never really know if there were ghosts at Bly Manor, but in the end, that's irrelevant. The ghosts exist inside the governess' head, perhaps not as the spirits of the former governess and her lover, but at least in the form of the world constructed within the current governess' head. In a strange way, she is both narrator and reader of her own story, not only telling us what is happening, but simultaneously inviting us to join her in her own understanding of what she witnesses.

[sandydog1_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A little novel about a dear little boy and a dear little girl, who are plagued by ghosts of of their previous caretakers, who may or may not have taken part in little perversions. The little children live in a mansion full of little rooms, run by a governess who may be a little crazy. The plot suffers from a little bit of ambiguity. I guess it's time to read a dozen critical essays on this classic. Until then, 3 - more than a little generous - stars.

[ctpress_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I've read [Washington Square] (which I liked) and [Portrait of a Woman] which I didn't like - now here's another one by Henry James that I didn't like.This is about a governess who takes care of two children and the landlord or master or whatever is not around - and then she sees dead people (ghosts) (former employees) - or does she? And do the children see the manifestations? There's nothing all that shocking about these ghost's - but I wondered about the children's behavior. There was something eerie about them, but I couldn't put my finger on it exactly - and of course the ending is up to discussion, and I won't go there. No need to, because frankly, half way through I was quite indifferent. All the repetitions and speculations and strange conversations…It was too much. The writing is very "rich" or "complex" and I struggled with the sentences, having to read them twice or three times and sometimes I just gave up. So even though it's a short novel it took forever to finish. Only because I can be so stubborn sometimes with novels.But as it is a very popular classic I guess other's have very different experience with it….

[john257hopper · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I tried to read this classic Victorian story of haunted children years ago, but quickly gave up as I could not cut my way through the impenetrable language in which it was written; this time, I have succeeded in reading it, but I cannot say I have enjoyed the experience (and if it had been a full length novel rather than a novella of 117 pages in my edition, I probably would have failed a second time to get through it). I am a considerable reader of classic Victorian novels and have no problem with the more challenging language in which they are often written, compared to more modern writing, but here the language is often so opaque that I frequently read a sentence four or five times and still could not divine its meaning. The effort in doing so does not repay, as I found the story to have no real atmosphere and to be hardly chilling at all, except at brief moments and at the very end. A disappointment that for me does not deserve its high reputation.

[engpunk77 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Read this about 4 times in college, and I was thinking about it today (thinking about how much I enjoyed discussing literature at length and writing essays about my crazy interpretations). I enjoyed arguing a thesis about what was actually haunting the house...I believe I argued that it was a forbidden lust or something.

[krista.rutherford · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The sentences are very long. That's fun sometimes. Whether it's a story about ghosts or a psychological disturbance is entirely subject to your preference.

[berly_4 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I don't know why I was so irritated this time round, but I was. It was a chore to read. The writing seemed so roundabout, with sentences wandering hopelessly. Several of the premises didn't ring true and I felt no love for the governess or the children. And the ending...did her young charge, Miles the boy, die?!? What then happened his sister? Was Flora never to return? Was the governess discharged? Who was the man she "loved" as hinted at in the beginning of this tale by Douglas? The questions go on and on. Many people have stipulated that [The Turn of the Screw]'s "very ambiguity, its resistance to any final formulation in terms of the realistic or actual...is a major source of its strength." I would disagree. Most unsatisfying.

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

After reading The Turn of the Screw by Henry James all I can say is "Huh”? I was looking forward to reading this old fashioned ghost story so I wrapped myself up in a quilt and curled up in my comfy chair all ready for the chills I thought this ghost story would bring, and indeed at first it was everything I hoped for. But the ambiguous ending spoiled this story for me. I wanted resolution not confusion.The story of a governess who slowly comes to realize that her charges are being haunted by the corrupt former valet, Quint and ex-governess, Miss Jessel is a fascinating one. The story builds slowly, and by the time the governess realizes that the children know full well of these ghostly apparitions, we, the readers have become aware that Quint may well have sexually assaulted the young boy, Miles. The young girl, Flora, seems to be stalked by Miss Jessel, the former governess who was involved in an affair with Quint. Eventually Flora is removed from the house and sent to be with her uncle. This leaves Miles and the current governess to confront Quint, which they do and instead of the resolution that I hoped I would find, I was left feeling quite confused over what just happened. A number of questions about the children and their safety springs to mind, but for me the biggest question was did all this really happen or was this simply a product of the governess’ psychotic imagination. The story was appropriately chilling and certainly creepy enough, but I would rather have had an ending that I understood instead of all these questions, but perhaps this was exactly how Henry James wanted to leave his readers.

[rab1953-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A compelling psychological novel with ghosts, this story is both creepy and intriguing. As always, James’ first interest is in the psychological relationships between his characters, in this case a naïve young governess, unnamed, and her two young pupils, Miles and Flora, at an isolated Essex mansion. The governess is charmed by the children’s apparent good natures and beauty, and ascribes to them an innocence that seems idealized, but completely typical of the late Victorian thinking about children. (And James himself had no children of his own to compare the ideal with.)The governess soon discovers that the children have a dark side, which seems to be associated with their previous governess, Miss Jessel, and her lover, the valet, Peter Quint. She and the children see these dead beings, although no one else in the house seems to do so. The housekeeper, Mrs. Grose, however, knows things are not right with the children. What is interesting is that the governess is unwilling to confront the children directly with her believe that they are happily communing with the evil dead for fear of finding out that they are not as innocent as they appear. Not only would this disturb her illusions about the children, but she would then have to deal with their choice, and she has no idea how to do so. As long as she can, she prefers to live with the illusion of goodness rather than have to deal with evil. That’s a situation that’s easy enough to identify with.But of course it leaves her vulnerable, and the children know it. They use her unwillingness to confront them to manipulate her into going along with their continuing relationship with their former guides. Because she won’t admit there is anything wrong, she cannot object to their play, even when they seem to be meeting with their evil partners. She tries to protect them, but they or the ghosts can see what she is doing and find ways around her care. When finally she is forced to act, she finds that the evil is more powerful than her attempt to overcome it. This all takes place in the first-person narrative of the governess, so she is describing what she sees and how she feels. She feels that she is being manipulated by the children, but she has no way to know what they are really thinking. She reads their looks and glances and reacts to them, but as readers we know only her interpretation of what she sees. She sees shadows and figures, and to her they appear as the ghosts of the Miss Jessel and Peter Quint. She thinks that the ghosts are manipulating the children, but it sometimes appears that the children are the manipulators. If it isn’t all in her own head.The picture of the innocence of the children, their good breeding, manners and charm as a mask hiding their corrupted true nature gives the story an extra layer of intrigue, one that James also explores in his other writing.What I like here is the psychology of the relationships and James’ ability to portray their shifting dynamics. At times, the governess tries to take charge, but loses control when one of the children shows that he or she knows that is going on, or suggests that the governess has shown bad judgement. The governess accepts the shifting power and loses it. This is a theme that James uses in other novels, and through it James illustrates how subtle social power is exercised. Of course, his characters could reject the social conventions that are at work, but that would be inconceivable to them. In this way, the ghosts are a bit of an excuse. They set up a situation in which the characters work out their relationships, and the extremity of the situation makes the dynamics unavoidable. But the relationship are created by the social situation and how the characters act in it. That, I think, is what interests James, and it’s what I read his books for.

[bookmarque · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is one of those books that I hadn’t read despite it being mentioned pretty much every time someone called for a good ghost story. During our latest winter storm I decided it would be a good time to dive into it and for the most part I really liked it. It had excellent pacing and the story was trim, not a lot of extraneous detail. There’s the set up, which is folks gathered around a fire to hear a scary story, the prologue which puts our protagonist in place and then we’re off. Strangely the tale just ends and we never get back into the room with the fire. I wonder if James forgot or his editor or what, but those people never show up again. Kind of sloppy if you ask me.And there’s that ending. Wow. It came on extra suddenly for me because I read it as a Project Gutenberg ebook which has a lot of publishing info at the back so it’s hard to tell exactly where the book ends. Is it me, or does everyone have to read the ending three times to get it straight? And by straight I mean bendy and weird and what? Spoilers on the move - I knew it was a psychological horror story going in and that there might be more to the story than what’s on the surface. I don’t want to go so far as to declare an unreliable narrator, but it’s close. Even if what Jane perceived wasn’t real, she believed that it was and to me, that’s not an unreliable narrator, merely a fallible one. Are there the ghosts of servants past haunting the old pile, or is Jane crazy? Does Miles have some sort of symbiotic connection to Peter Quint? Does getting Flora away from the place break hers to Miss Jessel? There are no concrete answers. Instead, James relies on the reader’s interpretation of some pretty unspecific information. For example, just why are these ghosts so evil and is their evil different now than it was in life? Both are branded as villains, but nothing is specifically stated about what they did exactly. It’s hinted that there was an illicit affair going on between them, very improper, and somehow because the children were aware of it, the knowledge corrupted them. Did that lead to Miles’s unknown crime that got him kicked out of school? And speaking of unfathomable and unresolved...what’s with the uncle’s condition that Jane never contact him about the kids? That’s just weird. The whole thing is weird and that’s what makes it fun.The actual writing, I should warn you, is convoluted. James is fond of the very long sentence populated by many, many commas. At first it was a job getting into the rhythm of his writing, but reading out loud helped, something I find useful for older novels. As you might have guessed, if you’re the type of reader who needs everything explained and tied up neatly, The Turn of the Screw isn’t the ghost story for you.

[kelley.logan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Haunting and haunted and ambiguous. Don't read this for a pat ending.