The Turn of the Screw, and Other Short Novels
by Henry James
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A collection of six short novels from the celebrated author of The Portrait of a Lady and Washington Square... By turns chilling, funny, tragic, and profound, Henry James's short novels allow readers to experience the full range of his skills and vision. The title story, a chilling masterpiece of psychological terror, mixes the phantoms of the mind with those of the supernatural. "Daisy Miller," the tale of a provincial American girl in Rome that established James's literary reputation, show more and "An International Episode" are superb examples of his focus on the clash between American and European values. And in "The Aspern Papers," "The Alter of the Dead," and "The Beast in the Jungle," the author's remarkable sense of irony, his love of plot twists, and his view of male-female relationships find exquisite expression. With an Introduction by Fred Kaplan show lessTags
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This book has been a harrowing journey for me. Full disclosure: I didn't finish the last 30 pages. I've been reading this book for weeks, and it started out so wonderfully and then trudged to a slow and agonizing end. I bought this book of short stories, because I love Daisy Miller, and I needed to own it. Upon second reading, I still love Daisy Miller. A pattern develops upon reading it in conjunction with the other stories. A man, who is far too introspective and certain in the truth of his worldview, finds a female companion who baffles him because of his limited perspective and inability to practice empathy. The moral of each either being that women are a mystery, or that men's limited understanding of women and inability to see show more them as equally as human as they are prevents them from realizing important life-saving truths. This pattern is clear in each story aside from The Turn of the Screw. So, I found these women to be fascinating, and I can't decide whether I loved or hated digging out the reality of them by analyzing that which mystified the narrators. Weirdly enough, the eponymous story of this collection is where it all fell apart for me. While James's many clauses and long sentences add beautiful description and detail to the earlier stories, they turned The Turn of the Screw into a slow wordy agony. The mystery and suspense of this ghost story were lost in the redundancy of the language. While the story is a fascinating example of ambiguity, the delivery is slow and allows the plot to be easily predicted. The last story, The Beast in the Jungle, seems to suffer from the same problem. show less
Hooray! I persevered and got through this. I had tried reading a James novel years ago (maybe Portrait of a Woman?) and could not get through it. I thought maybe it was because I was young and that I would like his short novels better. Silly me. I just cannot get into his writing style. I'm not sure what the problem is. I don't mind verbose writers who pen long sentences and wandering paragraphs (T. R. Pearson and Robert Penn Warren are favorites of mine), but there's something about James's lengthy sentences that sets my teeth on edge and make it difficult for me to follow. Of the stories in this collection, I liked "The Turn of the Screw" the best, probably, followed by "The Altar of the Dead." But I will not be reading any more Henry show more James! show less
The Turn of the Screw is a rather famous and critically renowned novella in American literary history. I wasn't entirely sure what to expect when I started into the story. I specifically avoided the wealth of critical theory and interpretations out there. After finishing, I'm very curious to see the many possible discussions that have been spurred by this book.
The narrative style is simple and easily accessible. For modern readers, it may present itself a little daunting at first because of the high/antiquated language of the 19th century. But truly, it's not a difficult read. The language is very lovely. The descriptions are vibrant and intriguing. And the story is interesting.
The way the plot is laid out was somewhat interesting to show more me. It starts with a group of characters sitting around telling stories and one of them decides to read this account from a journal he's discovered/received. The rest of the story is then this journal.
That presentation in itself isn't terribly odd. What was intriguing to me was that the framing was simple and subtle but the overall purpose is ambiguous. We're told that the original storyteller (the man who has the journal) has a connection to the governess. The exact nature of his connection is left ambiguous to the extent that I sometimes wondered if he (the man) was a grown version of one of the children in the story (assuming a different name). Once I decided that wasn't the case, I was interested to see if he would have some sort of epilogue for what happened AFTER the final words of the journal. If he was close enough to the governess to now have her story, then it's somewhat strange that we have this exclusion of his own interpretation or of commentary after the fact.
The story of the governess and the children is interesting…eerie…somewhat chilling at times. It's not a shocking tale of horror and fear. But James does a great job of portraying the horror of emotion that the governess feels and that makes its way into the life around her. The interactions with the ghosts and the nature of the behavior of the children were strange and distanced. It was difficult for me to decide what was real and what was imagined. Many times I thought the governess was going insane. Other times I was certain she was on the right track. In many instances it felt like her leaps of logic were a little too far fetched and that she made too many wild assumptions. But it was interesting to see how things played out with her and with her interactions with her single confidant Mrs. Grose.
The ending left me stunned and with a whole set of new questions to think on. I enjoyed the story. It is definitely engaging. I really wanted more of a wrap up…more closure…more something after the current ending. Still, leaving this abrupt, shocking ending is certainly more powerful and long-lasting than if the author had stepped back and wrapped everything up in a nice neat bow.
Overall, this was a good story and I look forward to reading more by Henry James when I get the chance.
****
4 out of 5 stars show less
The narrative style is simple and easily accessible. For modern readers, it may present itself a little daunting at first because of the high/antiquated language of the 19th century. But truly, it's not a difficult read. The language is very lovely. The descriptions are vibrant and intriguing. And the story is interesting.
The way the plot is laid out was somewhat interesting to show more me. It starts with a group of characters sitting around telling stories and one of them decides to read this account from a journal he's discovered/received. The rest of the story is then this journal.
That presentation in itself isn't terribly odd. What was intriguing to me was that the framing was simple and subtle but the overall purpose is ambiguous. We're told that the original storyteller (the man who has the journal) has a connection to the governess. The exact nature of his connection is left ambiguous to the extent that I sometimes wondered if he (the man) was a grown version of one of the children in the story (assuming a different name). Once I decided that wasn't the case, I was interested to see if he would have some sort of epilogue for what happened AFTER the final words of the journal. If he was close enough to the governess to now have her story, then it's somewhat strange that we have this exclusion of his own interpretation or of commentary after the fact.
The story of the governess and the children is interesting…eerie…somewhat chilling at times. It's not a shocking tale of horror and fear. But James does a great job of portraying the horror of emotion that the governess feels and that makes its way into the life around her. The interactions with the ghosts and the nature of the behavior of the children were strange and distanced. It was difficult for me to decide what was real and what was imagined. Many times I thought the governess was going insane. Other times I was certain she was on the right track. In many instances it felt like her leaps of logic were a little too far fetched and that she made too many wild assumptions. But it was interesting to see how things played out with her and with her interactions with her single confidant Mrs. Grose.
The ending left me stunned and with a whole set of new questions to think on. I enjoyed the story. It is definitely engaging. I really wanted more of a wrap up…more closure…more something after the current ending. Still, leaving this abrupt, shocking ending is certainly more powerful and long-lasting than if the author had stepped back and wrapped everything up in a nice neat bow.
Overall, this was a good story and I look forward to reading more by Henry James when I get the chance.
****
4 out of 5 stars show less
Read during Fall 2001
It should have been more unnerving. I have been reading alot of Henry James recently and I find his long passages of phsycological explanation interesting but here, it pulled me away from the terror of the other passages. Perhaps I should have read this all in one sitting. It didn't benefit from my breaking it up as well as James doing the same.
Reread in 2019
Still don't get. I think this is actually the third time and the main thrust still evades me. This time I read it for bookclub so maybe someone else will get more from it and tell me what I keep missing.
It should have been more unnerving. I have been reading alot of Henry James recently and I find his long passages of phsycological explanation interesting but here, it pulled me away from the terror of the other passages. Perhaps I should have read this all in one sitting. It didn't benefit from my breaking it up as well as James doing the same.
Reread in 2019
Still don't get. I think this is actually the third time and the main thrust still evades me. This time I read it for bookclub so maybe someone else will get more from it and tell me what I keep missing.
An International Episode and Daisy Miller: A Study were my two favorites. The Turning of a Screw confused me and I did a Wikipedia search after reading it to make sure I understood the story correctly. (I did.) I enjoyed the literary analysis that has been done on that story, which I read about on Wikipedia -- were there really ghosts or was the governess insane!
I'm glad I read these. I greatly enjoyed reading some classic tales, especially since I haven't read any Classics since college (a year and a half ago), but I won't be keeping this book. I didn't enjoy Henry James' writing enough to reread these, unfortunately.
Adrianne
I'm glad I read these. I greatly enjoyed reading some classic tales, especially since I haven't read any Classics since college (a year and a half ago), but I won't be keeping this book. I didn't enjoy Henry James' writing enough to reread these, unfortunately.
Adrianne
An International Episode (1878): ** A chore to read. It's well written, just full of silly people doing uninteresting things.
Daisy Miller (1878):
The Aspern Papers(1888):
The Altar of the Dead (1895):
The Turn of the Screw (1898): *** By far the most famous of the stories collected here. There's a lot to digest, but I think we're dealing here with an unreliable narrator. Frankly, the woman is nuts. Not what I expected.
The Beast in the Jungle (1903):
Daisy Miller (1878):
The Aspern Papers(1888):
The Altar of the Dead (1895):
The Turn of the Screw (1898): *** By far the most famous of the stories collected here. There's a lot to digest, but I think we're dealing here with an unreliable narrator. Frankly, the woman is nuts. Not what I expected.
The Beast in the Jungle (1903):
An excellent ghost/psychological disintegration story.
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- Canonical title
- The Turn of the Screw, and Other Short Novels
- Related movies
- The Innocents (1961 | IMDb); Turn of the Screw by Benjamin Britten (2004 | IMDb)
- Canonical DDC/MDS
- 813.4
- Canonical LCC
- PS2116
- Disambiguation notice
- Do not combine this work, The Turn of the Screw and other short novels, with The Turn of the Screw by Henry James; the works are related and indicated by their work-to-work relationships but are not the s... (show all)ame work.
Specifically, this work also contains:- The Altar of the Dead by Henry James
- The Aspern Papers by Henry James
- The Beast in the Jungle by Henry James
- Daisy Miller: a study by Henry James
- An International Episode by Henry James
This collection is separate from The Turn of the Screw and Other Stories. This is a Signet Classics printing from the 1960's. Notice this title contains Short Novels (vs. Short Stories). Please review the work-to-work relatio... (show all)nship for additional details.
There is also a work The Turn of the Screw, and Other Short Fiction, which is again different.
Do not combine this work, The Turn of the Screw and Other Short Novels by Henry James, with The Turn of the Screw by Henry James. This work contains that one but they are not identical.
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