Henry James, Turn of the Screw 1898

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Henry James, Turn of the Screw (1898)

• From Text to Film and Stage Play

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Text

• From Text to Film (and Stage Play)

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Notes

• T. J. Lustig, editor of Oxford World Classics
  edition, 115.23. Griffins ghost, or whatever it
  was Douglas seems to stop well short of full
  credulity. Surprisingly this is the only use of
  the word ghost in the novel (250).

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Notes

• In his preface Henry James remarks Good
  ghosts, speaking by book, make poor subjects, and
  it was clear that from the first my hovering
  prowling blighting presences, my pair of abnormal
  agents, would have to depart altogether from the
  rules This is to say, I recognise again, that
  Peter Quint and Miss Jessel are not ghosts at
  all, as we now know the ghost, but goblins,
  elves, imps, demons as loosely constructed as
  those of the

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Notes

• old trials for witchcraft if not, more
  pleasingly, fairies of the legendary order,
  wooing their victims forth to see them dance
  under the moon (T.J. Lustig, Oxford ed. liii).

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Notes

• James uses a vocabulary other than this single
  instance of ghost, or whatever it was
• visitant 137, 143, 162, 235
• visitation 115
• visitor 139, 142, 154, 171, 186
• apparition 115, 155, 170, 174, 187
• the others 187, 227
• sprite 127

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Notes

• angel 124, 125, 141
• cherubs 140
• demons 181, 212, 232
• charm 133, 167, 180, 228
• horror 156, 158, 171, 181, 198, 220, 230, 236
• portentous 213, 216, 228, liii

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Notes

• Interpretations
• Single-reading
• Psychopathology of the governess
• Near-possession of the children by demons of
  Peter Quint and Miss Jessel
• Multiple-readings

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Notes

• Scene from Chapter VI
• Text
• Film (and Stage PlayAcadia University, 1962)
• The Innocents (1961
• The Turn of the Screw (2004)

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Comparison

• from chapter 6
• Suddenly, in these circumstances, I became
  aware that, on the other side of the Sea of Azof,
  we had an interested spectator. The way this
  knowledge gathered in me was the strangest thing
  in the world--Of the positive identity of the
  apparition I would assure myself as soon as the
  small clock of my courage should have ticked out
  the right second .

• from chapter 7
• "No--of her." I was conscious as I spoke
  that I looked prodigious things, for I got the
  slow reflection of them in my companion's face.
  "Another person--this time but a figure of quite
  as unmistakable horror and evil a woman in
  black, pale and dreadful--with such an air also,
  and such a face!--on the other side of the lake.
  I was there with the child--quiet for the hour
  and in the midst of it she came."

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Questions (Thesis Answer)

• What is the difference between the text of the
  novella and the film with respect to narration?
• Is there any difference in effect for the reader
  versus the viewer with respect to imaginaton and
  the sacred?

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Further Reading

• From E.L. Lustigs Introduction to the Oxford
  World Classics edition, viii
• The Turn of the Screw has an intensity
• and a power to disturb which makes it
  at
• least the equal of works like Dr
  Jekyll and
• Mr Hyde (1886), The Picture of Dorian
  Gray
• (1891), Dracula (1897), and Heart of
  Darkness
• (1899).

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Filmography

• The Innocents. Dir. Jack Clayton.
• Twentieth Century Fox, 1961,
• 1989.
• The Others. Dir. Alejandro
• Amenabar. Alliance Atlantis,
• 2001.

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Filmography

• The Turn of the Screw. Dir. Dan
• Curtis. MPI Home Video, 2002. The Turn of
  the Screw. Dir. Ben
• Bolt. WGBH Educational
• Foundation, 2004.

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Work Cited

• James, Henry. The Turn of the
• Screw and Other Stories. Ed. T.J.
• Lustig. Oxford Worlds Classics.
• Oxford University Press, 1992,
• 1998.