Another Turn on James's "The Turn of the Screw"

IN HIS PREFACE to New York Edition of The Turn of Screw (I908), Henry James confidently asserted this was kind of story least apt to be baited by earnest criticism.1 Yet from date story was published in I898 it has continued to agitate pens of commentators and critics. Early commentary was content with epithetically patting and praising work: it has variously been called indescribably hellish,2 the most monstrous and incredible ghost-story,3 the most eerie and harrowing4 story ever written, yet the finest work he has ever done.5 More recent criticism, however, has been occupied almost exclusively with question of interpretation. There are two schools of thought: more traditional interpretation holds that dead servants, in a preternatural flair of evil, actually returned to haunt children; more recent psychological theory is based on belief that governess alone was possessed of these demons, that her sexually frustrated mind generated ghosts and atmosphere of corruption surrounding innocent children. Although many critics have disagreed with this latter interpretation, none, so far as I have been able to ascertain, have attempted a refutation of specific arguments presented.6 It is purpose of this paper to present briefly conclusions of psychological interpretation, and by re-examining them in light of internal evidence and of James's critical comments on story to show how little basis there is for such a theory.