Introduction
Henry James is the author of the ghost story The Turn of the Screw and an American writer who has written many stories and plays. In work, a young governess settles into the Bly estate to look after Flora and Miles, a sister and brother of 8 and 10 years old, who remained in the care of their uncle after the death of their parents. The governess begins to see ghosts – the deceased educators of children – who, according to rumors, were disgusting people. Children seem perfect to the girl at first, but then she notices that they have flaws and sometimes want to be naughty. In Turn of the Screw by Henry James, the governess is a young woman who thinks she’s taking care of the children but, in fact, is taking care of her own needs.
Analysis
Starting to read the work, readers understand that the governess falls in love with the children’s uncle, but it is difficult to know until the end whether this infatuation drives her crazy. In the end, it is this attraction to the uncle that becomes the main reason for the governess’s failures. At first, she sincerely wanted to take care of the children, but then her personal interest began to be “casual” meetings with an employer with whom she was deeply in love. At the beginning of the novel, she claims that “rather easily carried away,” and this may be the reason that she sees ghosts (James 8). That is, every time she has inappropriate thoughts, she sees ghosts at home.
The governess can be considered insane since, on the one hand, she tries to seem like a person who seeks to take care of her wards, but on the other hand, she is attracted to her uncle, then to the eldest boy, Miles. She begins to see ghosts while in the process of “giving pleasure… to the person to whose pressure I had yielded,” that is, she had specific fantasies about the children’s uncle (James 15). The reader can see that the governess’s care is not as clearly traced as she tries to show, but her sexual urges have a brighter coloring. This demonstrates that she does not care so much about the children as about her own needs.
The governess was crazy because she was so obsessed with falling in love with the boy and girl’s uncle that she started seeing ghosts. These ghosts threatened her and the children, and she tried so passionately and desperately to protect him that she caused the boy’s death. She hugged him so tightly that she eventually strangled him, and his heart stopped (James 98). In pursuit of her carnal desires, she forgave the tricks of the children and did not work to help solve their problems. Her obsession with her sexual fantasies became crucial in her insanity and Miles’ subsequent death.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the work of Henry James, The Turn of the Screw, is a mystical-psychological story about a governess who, from a passionate attraction to a man, began to see ghosts and go crazy. She was so obsessed with her passion for the children’s uncle that constant frightening encounters with ghosts caused her insanity and the accidental murder of a child. Although the governess thought she was taking care of the children, her main goal was to revive the once-suppressed sexual desires.
Work Cited
James, Henry. The Turn of the Screw. Tribeca Books, 2011.