Review: The Turn of the Screw

(Image courtesy of Unsplash)

28th October 2021

By Grace Bishop

Do you love curling up with a creepy book or snuggling up to watch a sinister movie during the Halloween season? If yes, then this novel is perfect for you.

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James remains one of the most ambiguous novels I have endeavoured to read. A classic gothic tale balancing between psychological madness and paranormal debate. However, a significant question underlines the entire plot; who do you believe?

This is a short ghost story published in 1898 which begins with a gathering of people at Christmas telling their best ghost stories. One character possesses the testimony of a manuscript from the governess recounting her events at Bly Manor, many years previously.

There seems to be some sexual undercurrent throughout the relationship between Peter Quint and Miss Jessel. With growing horror, the helpless governess realises the fiendish creatures want the children, seeking to corrupt their bodies, possess their minds, own their souls. But worse - much worse - the governess discovers that Miles and Flora have no terror of the lurking evil.

Some believe the ghosts to be figments of the governess’ imagination considering no other character manages to see these apparitions in the Bly grounds. This in turn questions the reliability of the narrator who is recounting these events to the reader. Others claim the novel is shrouded in mysterious supernatural activity. The problem for the Freudian reading of the story is that, while the children do not see the ghosts, the reader does. James invoked the evil and haunting presence of Peter Quint and Miss Jessel with consummate zeal and energy. Thus, he managed to have it both ways. The ghosts existed, it is true, only in the mind of the governess; the ghosts, more importantly, also give the reader the creeps.

The story has had enormous influence, indirectly, on the structure and tone of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, begun very soon after Conrad read The Turn of the Screw, and on films such as The Others, made in 2001, starring Nicole Kidman. In 1954, Benjamin Britten's opera based on the story was first produced. In 1971, Marlon Brando starred as the evil Peter Quint in The Nightcomers, a dark prequel to James's story. With several adaptations of this classic tale; the most recent being the 2020 Netflix series “The Haunting of Bly Manor’ starring Victoria Pedretti as the governess.

In many ways it is written as a stream of consciousness from a woman in the late 1800’s, which provides both an interesting social and cultural reference to the novel as well. For those who enjoy a wide variety of style and pacing this novella will have great appeal.

Overall, the classic tale of The Turn of the Screw is a wonderful psychological exploration that leaves the reader to contemplate who is terrorised and by who.