620 James, Henry
The characters, too, are marked by varying
degrees of isolation. The governess comes into a
position of authority at this family home, but it is
not her home and there is almost no family intimacy.
The children are orphaned and consigned as wards
to a man who has no patience to take care of them.
Her employment as the children’s governess puts
her into a position like that of a mother, but without
the ties and tender bond of maternity. She is a hired
worker, a fact that forever isolates her from the chil-
dren. While the governess has suppressed feelings of
attraction for the children’s young, handsome bach-
elor guardian who hired her, she is, in fact, nothing
to him. A condition of her employment is that she
never have contact with him, that she relieve him
entirely of the unwanted burden of caring for his
orphaned niece and nephew. So while James tempts
us by dangling an eligible bachelor, a loner, who
could ostensibly be the children’s new father and the
governess’s helpmeet, he sets narrative restrictions
that prohibit those attachments and relationships
from being formed.
The other characters are isolated in different
ways. At the moment the governess arrives, Flora
has been alone with Mrs. Grose, the housekeeper.
Miles has been separated from Flora and placed at
a private school, although he has just been expelled.
When he returns to Bly, the children pair off, and
we learn by mid-tale that the governess suspects that
they are not engaging merely in childish activities,
such as reading to one another, but are talking of
the apparitions and conniving somehow to position
themselves to be corrupted by the two evil spirits.
The governess, struggling with a rising sense of
alarm at dangers unnamed, compensates for her
conditions of near-total estrangement from real con-
nections by throwing herself into a too-adoring care
for Flora and Miles. From the children’s perspective,
this clutching and sobbing young stranger must have
been a frightening and smothering presence.
The theme of isolation works on the level of
language and image as well. James is careful to word
Mrs. Grose’s—and the children’s—responses to the
governess in such a way that the reader can perceive
that the governess is imagining their thoughts.
Speaking of the children, the governess says to Mrs.
Grose,
“They’re not mine—they’re not ours. They’re
his and they’re hers.”
“Quint’s and that woman’s?”
“Quint’s and that woman’s. They want to
get them . . . .”
“But for what?”
“For the love of all the evil. . . . to keep up
the work of demons. . . .”
“Laws!” said my friend under her breath.
The exclamation was homely, but it revealed
a real acceptance of my further proof of what,
in the bad time—for there had been worse
even than this!—must have occurred.”The governess reads agreement into Mrs. Grose’s
response; but “Laws!” (meaning “Lordy”) could
just as easily be Mrs. Grose’s shock at the gov-
erness’s madness. This disconnection of language
reinforces the isolation underlying the characters’
experiences. The governess’s state of isolation plays
upon her mind, feeding her anxieties and desire for
connection. The governess’s visions are solely hers.
Of course, James’s point is to pose the question of
whether the ghosts are real or specters that arise
from the governess’s agitated psyche.
Trapped in her own nightmare, seeking reassur-
ance where none exists, the governess manages to
alienate—and frighten—both Flora and Mrs. Grose.
As they prepare to abandon Bly under the govern-
ess’s belief that they are under siege by demons
seeking to control the children, the ultimate state of
isolation is achieved. To cut Quint off from possess-
ing Miles, the governess cuts Miles off from life and
cuts off the vestiges of connection to the household
and her position. We have learned from Douglas
in the frame story that, although the governess
continued to find other similar work arrangements,
she will finally die without ever really belonging
anywhere or to anyone.
Ellen RosenbergSexuality in The Turn of the Screw
Henry James’s works embody the Victorian perspec-
tive, even while The Turn of the Screw is clearly mod-
ern in its psychological approach. This tale especially
reflects contradictory sets of ideas about sexuality,
sensuality, and eroticism that shaped social attitudes