Publisher's Synopsis
The Turn of the Screw is a horror novel by Henry James. The novel follows a governess who, caring for two children at a remote estate, becomes convinced that the grounds are haunted. The Turn of the Screw is considered a work of both Gothic and horror fiction.The Turn of the Screw traces the story of a young, inexperienced governess who is charged with the care of Miles and Flora, two small orphaned children abandoned by their uncle at his grand country house. The governess sees the figure of an unknown man on the tower and his face at the window; she also sees a woman. Mrs Grose, the housekeeper identifies the man as Peter Quint (the master's valet) and the woman as Miss Jessel (the former governess); but both are dead.A subtle, self-conscious exploration of the haunted house of Victorian culture, The Turn of the Screw can be read as a straightforward frightening ghost story. But are the apparitions of Quint and Miss Jessel what they seem? James imbues his text with sexual and social unease, which give the story an eerily equivocal atmosphere. Might these apparitions actually be in the governess's head?Henry James, brother of the philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James, was an American-born author, one of the founders and leaders of a school of realism in fiction. He spent much of his life in England and became a British subject shortly before his death. His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and unreliable narrators in his own novels and tales brought a new depth and interest to realistic fiction, and foreshadowed the modernist work of the twentieth century.
