Greetings! Today on the blog we start our new book study about Henry James’s Turn of the Screw (1898). This is a gothic novella (short novel) that is about a very peculiar haunting that causes fear, trauma, and the reader to question the narrator’s reliability. Stick with us over the next 4-5 weeks, and we will be covering a great deal about this novel and surrounding topics!
Prologue
The story begins delightfully on a Christmas Eve, with a group of people gathered around the fireplace. Much as was the tradition of yesteryear in telling ghost stories around Christmas (which can be seen in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol), this group is indulging in much of the same. The narrator, remaining anonymous, discusses Douglas, one of the guests, and the strange story that he tells them that involves two children named Flora and Miles.
Douglas himself seems troubled by the story, and stands “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.” A look of shame crossing him, he states: “Nobody but me, till now, has ever heard. It’s quite too horrible.” The crowd of guests of course turn on him and compel him to tell his story: “It’s beyond everything. Nothing at all that I know touches it.”
Before sharing his ghost story, and in a bit of back story, Douglas gives some details: a governess, who was a young and poor daughter of a country parson, accepts a position as governess with a charming bachelor in a grand house on Harley Street. She is hired to care for the two aforementioned children. The children are under the current care of the housekeeper Mrs. Grose and other servants; meanwhile, the previous governess has died. Preparing himself, Douglas reads from papers he has collected, which apparently contain the story itself.
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2
The story begins most unseemly at first, with the governess starting her position at Bly. She meets Flora and the maid, Mrs. Grose. Flora calms the governess’s nerves about her new job through her beauty and spiritedness. The next day, the governess receives a letter from her employer who informs her that Miles’s headmaster refuses to let him return to school. Nervous about the boy due to probably behavior problems, the governess is anxious, but Mrs. Grose assures her that Miles is simply acting out as boys are want to do at their age and in some circumstances.
In a concerning moment, the governess learns that the previous governess was a young, pretty woman who was well-liked by both children and the master. However, she left Bly on holiday and never returned, and was later reported dead due to mysterious circumstances. In the exchange between the new governess and Mrs. Grose, there is both shock and surprise from both parties:
“She was not taken ill, so far as appeared, in this house. She left it, at the end of the year, to go home, as she said, for a short holiday, to which the time she had put in had certainly given her a right. We had then a young woman—a nursemaid who had stayed on and who was a good girl and clever; and she took the children altogether for the interval. But our young lady never came back, and at the very moment I was expecting her I heard from the master that she was dead.”
I turned this over. “But of what?”
“He never told me! But please, miss,” said Mrs. Grose, “I must get to my work.”
Chapter 3 – Chapter 4
The governess begins these chapters by thinking about her respect for Mrs. Grose, and then she meets Miles, and is likewise charmed by the young man, as he is both innocent and as beautiful as his sister, Flora. Both the governess and Mrs. Grose decide to ignore the letter detailing Miles’ expulsion and move on.
Her summer continues without error, and she actually finds that she quite enjoys her time at Bly. One evening, she sees a mysterious man on the tower, thinking that he was somebody she knew. Though, without knowing who he is, she finds the episode eerie. The man stares at her for some time before moving on.
As she states: “So I saw him as I see the letters I form on this page; then, exactly, after a minute, as if to add to the spectacle, he slowly changed his place—passed, looking at me hard all the while, to the opposite corner of the platform. Yes, I had the sharpest sense that during this transit he never took his eyes from me, and I can see at this moment the way his hand, as he went, passed from one of the crenelations to the next. He stopped at the other corner, but less long, and even as he turned away still markedly fixed me. He turned away; that was all I knew.”
Afterward, the governess thinks about this episode as being very strange, and wonders about a hidden mystery within the house. She walks home and meets Mrs. Grose in the hall. She realizes that the maid knows little and so does not mention it. Being careful and inquisitive when it comes to encounters in the house, the governess returns to her duties with little fear. Though, later, the governess sees the man staring through a window; she attempts to confront him but finds nothing. However, this time around, Mrs. Grose seems shaken, so she too has seen the mysterious figure.
Chapter 5
The governess describes the man to Mrs. Grose who is shocked by the entire affair. The governess also notes the man’s red hair, pale face, and handsome features. Mrs. Grose tells her that he was a man named Peter Quint, who was a former valet for the housemaster. However, it turns out that it would be impossible for him to have been in the window.
The story states:
She hung fire so long that I was still more mystified. “He went, too,” she brought out at last.
“Went where?”
Her expression, at this, became extraordinary. “God knows where! He died.”
“Died?” I almost shrieked.
She seemed fairly to square herself, plant herself more firmly to utter the wonder of it.
“Yes. Mr. Quint is dead.”
Analysis
We have here the classic trappings of a ghost story. One that features a doting governess, two small, innocent children, and a mystery of gothic proportions. James’s style is very calming and explanatory. It lulls the reader into a sense of calm before dropping a mysterious plot point down, which both entice and excite the reader. It may be slow, but it gives us the sense of foreboding we can expect in a gothic thriller.
Read this description of Mrs. Grose’s fear:
“She turned white, and this made me ask myself if I had blanched as much. She stared, in short, and retreated on just my lines, and I knew she had then passed out and come round to me and that I should presently meet her. I remained where I was, and while I waited I thought of more things than one. But there’s only one I take space to mention. I wondered why she should be scared.”
The language is clearly from 1889, but it is not ostentatious. It tells the story in a very straightforward manner, highlighting the fear that these strange occurrences cause to the people who are baring witness. In moving ahead, we have to keep in mind that the author is going to establish many norms for future ghost stories, but that should not deter us from how engaging and interesting this story is in reality.
Works Cited
Henry James. The Turn of the Screw. Project Gutenberg, 10 Oct. 1997, www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/209. Accessed July 29, 2024.
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