Turn of the Screw

Kristina Lee The Turn of the Screw: An Analysis of the Reliability of the Governess One of the most critically discussed works in twentieth-century American literature, The Turn of the Screw has inspired a variety of critical interpretations since its publication in 1898. Until 1934, the book was considered a traditional ghost story. Edmund Wilson, however, soon challenged that view with his assertions that The Turn of the Screw is a psychological study of the unstable governess whose visions of ghosts are merely delusions. WilsonпÑ--Ð...s essay initiated a critical debate concerning the interpretation of the novel, which continues even today (Poupard 313). Speculation considering the truth of the events occurring in The Turn of the Screw depends greatly on the readerпÑ--Ð...s assessment of the reliability of the governess as a narrator. According to the пÑ--Ð...apparitionistпÑ--Ð... reader, the ghosts are real, the governess is reliable and of sound mind, and the children are corrupted by the ghosts. The пÑ--Ð...hallucinationistпÑ--Ð..., on the other hand, would claim the ghosts are illusions of the governess, who is an unreliable narrator, and possibly insane, and the children are not debased by the ghosts (Poupard 314). The purpose of this essay is to explore the пÑ--Ð...hallucinationistпÑ--Ð... view in order to support the assertion that the governess is an unreliable narrator. By examining the manner in which she guesses the unseen from the seen, traces the implication of things, and judges the whole piece by the pattern and so arrives at her conclusions, I will demonstrate that the governess is an unreliable narrator. From the beginning of The Turn of the Screw, the reader quickly becomes aware that the governess has an active imagination. Her very first night at Bly, for example, пÑ--Ð...[t]here had been a moment when [she] believed [she] recognized, faint and...