Visions And Fantasies in The Turn Of The Screw by Henry James - Book Report/Review Example

Visions And Fantasies in The Turn Of The Screw Beginning with the introduction to The Turn Of The Screw, Henry James creates an atmosphere of confusion in which the truth is difficult to distinguish from fantasy. The structure of the novella itself, with a story inside a story-a man reading a tale around a fireplace during the Christmas holidays-removes the voice of the original narrator from the rest of the story and lessens the credibility of the narration. Then there is the matter of the primary character of the tale, the governess, who is mysteriously unnamed. She also sees visions no one else does, which create odd gaps in the storyline as well as strange moments of silence, at least as the governess’ describes them in her narration. Eventually, her visions also lead to the tragic end of the novella. The strange images which appear before the governess, along with her generally distracted nature, lend themselves to two different literary interpretations, Marxist and Feminist. Her own attraction to the wealth of the family which has hired her, with the potential of advancing her own financial situation, is an obsession which seems to have led to many of her visions. Her companion in taking care of the children, the illiterate Mrs. Grose, tells the governess that the person the governess “sees” around the grounds must be the former valet Peter Quint, since he was known to wear the clothes of the head of the house. But since the governess had never known him, no one else can now see him, and he had died, the most plausible explanation is that the governess’ vision is that of the head of the house. Before leaving for his country estate, she had met him in London on Halsey Street. She is described in the introduction as being impressed by him as “a gentleman, a bachelor in the prime of life...He struck her, inevitably, as gallant and splendid. She conceived him as rich, but as fearfully extravagant--saw him all in a glow of high fashion, of good looks, of expensive habits, of charming ways with women.” This quote from the Introduction is a pattern repeated throughout the story, as the governess fills in the gaps of the facts she doesn’t have with her own, mostly pleasant fantasies, at least of this gentleman who hired her. Her impressions of this man fit well into the Marxist theory of literary analysis, in which economic and social conditions are thought to override all concerns. Her obsession with the great advancement given to her by her new position becomes quite clear in Chapter III, in which her new feeling of possession would quickly be understood by any Marxist theorist: “I could take a turn into the grounds,” she says, “and enjoy, almost with a sense of property that amused and flattered me, the beauty and the dignity of the place.” In Chapter III, in the early days of her assignment, while all is still well, she says it was a pleasure at these moments to “feel myself tranquil and justified.” And the reason she feels that way is that she is, she believes, satisfying the man who hired her. “I was giving pleasure,” she said, “to the person to whose pressure I had responded. What I was doing was what he had earnestly hoped and directly asked of me, and that I could, after all, do it proved even a greater joy than I had expected. I daresay I fancied myself, in short, a remarkable young woman ...” The governess’ attitude towards the world is not strictly based on wealth and financial matters, however. Many of her beliefs are based on gender assumptions. These aspects of the James work make the novella an appropriate subject for an interpretation of a feminist literary approach, with its examinations of such issues as gender inequality and stereotyping. The governess has no interest in challenging the values of the patriarchal system, and derives her feeling of contentment and satisfaction from the notion that her actions will please the man with whom she is apparently obsessed. This salient aspect of the governess’ personality can be interpreted both in Marxist and feminist terms, since she wants to, and assumes she is, pleasing the man who has economic power over her, but also, as described in the Introduction, she is taken and perhaps obsessed with his masculinity. Douglas, who is introduced in the Introduction as the person reading a copy of the story “round the fire,” says the governess described the man to him as having “such a figure as had never risen, save in a dream or an old novel.” Before she has even seen Miles, the boy she is to instruct, the governess is disturbed by the word from her employer that the boy has done something that will not allow him to return to his school after the holiday break. After she meets him, she makes assumptions about him based only on his appearance and manner, assumptions based strictly on what she wants to believe about the boy. “If he had been wicked he would have ‘caught’ it,” she said. “And I should have caught it by the rebound--I should have found the trace. I found nothing at all, and he was therefore an angel.” The world in which the governess wants to live is one of wealth and success, which surrounds her in the elegance of the manor, though it can only be obtained through the master. She tells Mrs. Grose she has “no pretension” about her future with him, but it is quite possible that her strange visions are the result of her frustrations when she understands that, beyond her assignment, she won’t have the man in her life, nor his fancy possessions. When she started seeing about the grounds the man she decides, after discussions with Mrs. Grose, is Peter Quint, (but is more likely some version of the manor’s master) she becomes convinced that he represents pure evil. A feminist interpretation of the work would describe this as her need to drive away her misplaced desires for the manor’s owner, or, by Marxist theory, for the owner’s wealth. It is a way to keep herself down in what nineteenth century society has deemed her proper subservient position. In the fateful last chapter (XXIV) of the work, all of the governess’ obsessions lead to the final tragedy of the death of the young boy Miles. She has many gaps in her understanding of the family’s history, most notably the reason the young boy Miles was in trouble at his regular school. Her need to find out what happened turns into a compulsion for her, and when she insists on answers from him in the last two chapters, she does not give proper attention to his obviously failing health. The fever which is overwhelming and soon to kill him causes him to answer her questions in a hesitating manner. In Chapter XXIII, after explaining to him that she had stayed on just to find out what he had done wrong at school, she describes the long period of silence while she waits for him to answer: “He waited so long,” she said. “that I supposed it for the purpose of repudiating the assumption on which my action had been founded.” She is still interpreting the world through her own, often misguided thoughts and not through the facts, as apparent when she immediately noted: “But what he finally said was a response far different from what she expected: “‘Do you mean now–here?’” he said. In the last two chapters, Miles’ answers to her questions seem to startle the governess. At the start of the last chapter, after a long description of Peter Quint’s image (what she describes as “the face of damnation”) the governess’ thoughts are jarred when the boy breaks the silence to answer her question with a voice, which, in contrast to the visions of Quint, was “like a waft of fragrance.” The governess is obsessed to find out what the young boy did at school, and also to protect him from Peter Quint, the apparition she is sure is real. But she does not act on the quite evident signs of the fever soon to take his life. When he gives what she considers to be a satisfying response to one of her questions, she “kissed his forehead,” though she adds, “it was drenched.” Later, Miles “drew his breath, two or three times over, as if with difficulty.” His obviously failing health explains the many gaps of silence in his responses to her questions. She describes his manner as “quite detached and almost helpless,” and “still breathing hard,” but she continues to believe he is only troubled by her questions. At the end, though, while she held him, “his heart, dispossessed, had stopped.” The governess, unable to overcome her economic status, nor able to change the gender inequality of her position, has taken to fantasy for comfort. She is constantly declaring to herself her own goodness and her feelings of success. But her troubled mind has tried to fill in the gaps of knowledge that she doesn’t know about her hired family and most of her conclusions are driven by her own fantasies. In the process, she has ignored her true responsibility to take care of the children under her tutelage. Read More