Criticism acknowledging the work's insoluble ambiguity. By Brenda Murphy

A number of critics tried to explain the origin of ingrained and insoluble ambiguity and the effects of such ambiguity on the reader.

Brenda Murphy:

According to Brenda Murphy, controversies can never be resolved and there is n answer to the questions to the text raises.

For example, we cannot determine whether the author intended to write a ghost story or a story of mental illness. The critic will try to understand the author’s meaning in the context of an extrinsic genre, having already lost the possibility of grasping in the author’s actual intrinsic genre.

Murphy then turns to James’s statements about the story, which seem not to be sincere because his intentions are not clear neither related to what he has said about his own work.

Some other critics as Salomon and Aswel have ignored the author’s statements in the preface and established quite disparate interpretations, believing that the real meaning of the story was only in James’s conscious and imagination.

Nevertheless, Murphy considers impossible the fact of determining an unconscious purpose or intention unless it s made conscious. For her it is important to interpret words and actions, much as we interpret a text. But again the hermeneutic circle reappears. In deciding what element it is important to be considered, we are influenced by our own preconceptions so for Murphy, failure becomes inevitable, because the problem of the hermeneutic circle is a fact of what is perceived and what is communicated.

Furthermore, Murphy cites Hirsch’s critic that the author’s intended meaning enfolds analogous and unforeseeable implications, which of course are not known to its originator.

Sheppard

Sheppard

Elizabeth A. Sheppard analyzed “The Turn of the Screw” in order to understand what the author’s intention was and some of the elements of the plot, i.e. if the ghosts were real or the governess suffered from “mental illness”. Sheppard based her analysis on biographical research and on what Henry James read or did not read before writing the novella.

ü  She affirms that T.T.S. is based on the book called “The Proceedings” of the Society for Psychical Research”, an organization that believes in psychic and paranormal events and abilities. She explains that James could have never read or known about the existence of “Freud or Breuer’s Studies in Hysteria,” unless the philosopher and psychologist William James (Henry James’s brother) or Frederic Myers had influenced Henry to read them.

ü  She believes that after the death of his sister Alice who suffered from hysteria, James should not have continued reading about scientific treatises on hysteria.

ü  James might have been more interested in “The Proceedings” (1883) or “The Phantasms of the living” (1886) rather than in psychiatric material to write the novella. In TTS there are many details that are connected with these two books.

ü  She says that the “ghost are not mere hallucinations” that the governess experienced. Sheppard interprets this as “evidence against Freudian non-apparitionist readings.”

ü  Narrative frame: at the beginning of the story, we can notice the intention of the book about haunted children and not about the problems that the governess had. This can be seen with the recommendation that Douglas made about the governess, or with the expulsion of Miles from the school or with the bad language of Flora.

ü  Sheppard insists that the governess did not express “repressed sexuality” because of her love for her employer. Also, Sheppard points out that the first time the governess saw Quint was not because of this repressed sexuality but because she was daydreaming about her employer and it was not him who appeared to her.

ü  From the point of view of the Society for Psychical Research, the novella can be interpreted as a ghost story in which some kind of force is seen after death. “Quint and Miss Jessel died some months before” and clearly the governess was having a kind of connection with them. As regards Miles and Flora, they might have not seen anything or they could have been lying.

ü  Another interpretation could be “thought- transference or telepathy between living persons” In the story, Miles and Flora could have been obsessed with the people dead and the governess could have received these images of the deceased telepathically.

ü  The governess tried to protect the children from the evil ghosts.

ü  Sheppard affirms that Miles died and was damned because the governess performed an exorcism on him.

ü  NAMES:

      - Peter Quint: This name reminds Sheppard about the stage-manager of “A Midsummer   Night’s dream”. Also, Quint’s physical appearance helps Sheppard make a comparison with George Bernard Shaw. According to her, there was a strong dislike between James and Shaw. Quint did not wear a hat and was not dressed in an appropriate way. These characteristics “are reminiscent of Shaw’s carelessness”, which was something that James hated. James was a very elegant person.

           - Jessel: is a Jewish name which can be reminiscent of Shakespeare’s Jessica or the judge of the case of Annie Besant.

          - Miles and Flora: Latin names that represent the ideal male and female.

          - The Governess: she has no name. This is an authentic characteristic of Victorian times.

To conclude, I don’t really know if Sheppard believes in ghosts but she examined The Turn of the Screw from an apparitionist point of view. She refutes psychiatric material such as Freudian arguments.

I am a firm believer in ghosts and apparitions. I had some personal experiences and I know many cases of this subject. Imagine that I cannot believe that the governess suffered from mental illness.

The Turn of the Screw according to Albert F. Stone

Albert F. Stone, Jr. suggests that the reading of The Turn of the Screw should be understood as a mixture of Freudian and Marxist insights.
As a result of the Victorian social structure presented in the book, Stone maintains that it would be inevitable to victimize Flora and Miles. One of the instances belonging to this social system is the indifference of the uncle which was a main characteristic of upper class families. Another instance is the reliance to a vulnerable governess, who belongs to a middle class and is incapable of being tolerant of good and evil in all people. As a consequence of these psychological realities, which are socially engendered, the children are considered to be victimized.
Like Bontly and Spilka, he also defends the position of acknowledging the apparitions as real in the tale’s imaginary world. The governess sees the root of evil only in the ghosts, but it is everywhere, even in the world beyond Bly.
Stone, like Firebaugh, considers the governess not a savior but a “sexual aggressor”, preventing Miles from leaving Bly and seeing the world. This interpretation, Stone recalls, can be seen in the final scene, where Quint is described as ‘a sentinel before a prison’. Miles has not been repressed by the ghosts, but by the inexperienced and ignorant governess. What is more, Stone explains she is similar to Oedipus for her “dreadful boldness of mind” which “urges to uncover every secret”. In her attempt to know and control everything, Flora is forced to physical and emotional prostration and Miles to death. Furthermore, it is probable that the governess wants evil to be focused on Flora and Miles.
All in all, Stone’s article is a clear example of social psychological criticism. His analysis describes the psychological results of an unjust social structure such as the Victorian society.
But Stone believes the story cannot be reduced to this dimension, and he emphasizes the important effect on the reader. So he also offers a sociologically based reader-response criticism. In today’s reality the ghostly effect is not as effective as in that period, though it is essential for the confidences and words that are not spoken in the story providing not only a ghostly effect but also mystery and horror.

Taking into account Stone’s analysis of the book, I find it quite accurate and logical according not only to the social period but also to the psychological connection as a consequence of the social reality. Yet I personally believe that the sociologically reader-response criticism proposed by Stone is the most suitable because of the ambiguity used throughout the book.

Heilman

Heilman's interpretation of “The Turn of the Screw” is from an apparitionist point of view. He expresses that James constructed the work as a result of the cultural environment, which can also be seen in other works from the same period.
Heilman compares “The Pledge” of Duerrenmatt with James’ novel and he cites several similarities between the novellas:

- “Ghosts are real, evil entities”
- Grown-ups persuade children to do what they want.
- Children and evils have secret and expected encounters.

- In both novellas, not all the children accept the "threatening evil".
- The killer and Quint are alike because they have the same social status.
- In the novellas, the ghost and the killer want to hurt mentally and physically. The killer does not like women and he wants to hurt them and Quint and Miss Jessel want the children to “share their own infernal torments”.
- In both, there are symbolic interpretations. The author’s have chosen “fertility images” to introduce “images of death or decay", such as the garden.
- The apparitions are true but the main characters are thought to be mad. Heilman does not agree with this and he expresses that they are normal. They behave like this because of the difficulties they are undergoing.


What Heilman does not contemplate is the fact that Durrenmatt might have used James' novel as an example to construct his novella and that's why there are so many coincidences between them.

In conclusion, I find this analysis suitable and I agree with many of the points raised by Heilman. I believe that the ghosts are real and that the governess does not suffer from psychological problems.

Allen

Allen’s interpretation of TTS:

Allen’s criticism about “The Turn of the Screw” seems to be one that manifests atavism. It goes back in time claiming that the phantoms present in the story are real, disregarding all the critics who have turned their thoughts into the apparitionist or non-apparitionist theory or the ones who have just believed in the story’s ambiguity.

Under a traditional formalist reading of the plot, Allen points out that what James intended to write was a “ghost” story and the main evidence of this is the text itself.

The narrative structure (mainly the three-narrator frame) used in this novella gives credibility to the governess’s words. The rationales behind this idea are:

· “Douglas’s good recommendation of the governess”.

· “The respect that Douglas accords to the manuscript”.

· “The fact that Douglas does not divulge the governess’s name and that Douglas, in turn, is given authority by the 1^st person narrator – the anonymous guest”.

Allen stands out about the latter: “Although the `I' of the narrative frame is of course a fictional character, this is only so because of the fictional situation; that is, he (the real James) wrote the governess's story. The `I' is the `real' James in fictional garb: he supplies the title within the frame, is perceptive, etc., and is an uninvolved observer. His judgements and perceptions are accepted by the reader as the real James's judgements and perceptions, though his knowledge is limited, and he can thus be legitimately designated the implied James …”

Finally, in other words, the anonymous guest is of great importance since it should be regarded as “the author’s persona”. Consequently, it evokes the authority of the author. 

To conclude, as a formalist critic, Allen provides us with a traditional interpretation of the plot. It is a text centred analysis that focus is on words. Therefore, he does not even consider other theories in his analysis. Allen’s interpretation is simple and straight forward. However, it is essential for reading and interpreting this kind of complex literary work since first the reader needs to understand the work as it is and then he/she will be able to start reading and analysing the text between the lines.

WEST

Muriel West considered “The turn of the Screw” as a self-referential and self-contained, as she is a structuralist.  She didn’t take into account the external factors but the text itself.

She wrote A Stormy Night With The Turn of the Screw. It is a book which combines fiction with literary criticism and, in order to do this, she emulates the structure of “The Turn of the Screw”. “A stormy Night” is based in an anonymous manuscript edited by someone called H.K.Y. and told by a narrator who obtained it in a package of old books who bought at an auction.

In the book, the editor, H.K.Y., made comments that affected the reader’s perceptions. For example, we can appreciate the way in which events are presented. At first we can’t understand them, so it is easy to get confused and to consider them unnatural, but then we can find a natural and logical cause.

It’s pretty suitable the way the Turn of the Screw is analyzed by West. As a structuralist, we can see that she didn’t influence our perceptions, she didn’t tell us if we should followed a non-apparition or an apparition perspective but she took the most intriguing part of this book, its structure, its ambiguity. This ambiguity is key of the success of this novella.

HEILMAN- TTS Critical Interpretation

Heilman develops his essay from an apparitionist standpoint. He claims that the reader is to trust the story as it is narrated, that is, the governess's assumptions about the ghosts and their alliance with the children are to be considered real facts. He thinks that the story revolves about the conflict between good and evil, more precisely about "the struggle of evil to possess the human soul".

He thus concludes that the novella can be interpreted in terms of symbolic representations of religious matters. To support this view, he mainly focuses on the patterns of language used throughout   (motif, symbol, image and archetype) and draws some comparisons between the story and religious elements. These are some of the examples he provides: he compares Bly to the Garden of Eden, Miles and Flora to Adam and Eve, Peter Quint to the serpent in the Garden of Eden (he is described with characteristics of a snake), the last scene is taken as representing the Catholic sacrament of confession, the governess is shown as a savior, etc. 

Though I personally find this interpretation amazing in that Heilman's examples and justifications may perfectly work, I do not quite agree with him because I think that even though the governess seems a reliable character at the beginning of the story she loses all credibility by the end, so I'm more inclined to believe that she suffers from psychological problems and that the ghosts are only part of her own imagination.

Carvel Collins

Carvel Collins bases his literary analysis of “The Turn of the Screw” on those controversial ambiguities which have generated so many discussions among critics. Collins agrees with Wilson in that the story would be dull without its ambiguities and he suggests an additional one- according to him, Douglas and Miles are the same person. This interpretation strengthens Wilson’s view about Miles’ death- the fact that Miles does not die at the end of the story as the Governess says. Both critics believe that the Governess is an inaccurate witness and a victim of hallucinations.

In order to support his interpretation, Collins states various similarities from the plot: 

•    Only Douglas’ last name appears/ Only Miles’ first name appears.

•  Douglas is ten years younger than the Governess/ Miles is ten when the Governess is twenty.

• The woman is the governess of Miles’ sister when Miles comes home from boarding school/ When Douglas comes home from college he talks with the Governess who has been his sister’s governess.

Moreover, Collins believes that by carefully arranging details, Henry James opens the possibility of considering yet another ambiguity: that the Governess’ manuscript is a clear evidence of her mental illness.

We should bear in mind that Collins’ reading of the story is a possible one. He presents it as a “meaningful ambiguity” . Collins is doing what James expected from critics to do- “filling the blanks from their own imaginations”

Collins is clearly in the non-apparitionist camp, but he acknowledges that no interpretation can be proven to be exclusively correct. In this sense I agree with him. I believe “The Turn of the Screw” allows readers to develop countless of different -and even opposing- readings, all valid.  
The richness of this story is precisely in the understanding of how it works.

Judith Fryer - The Turn of the Screw

According to Judith Fryer, whether the ghosts are real or not is not something relevant. She believes that the governess sees her own psychic projections, not real people. Moreover, she focuses her attention mainly on the governess’ personality. She describes her as a possessive character who leads the children to destruction. According to this author, everything is black and white for the protagonist, which is clearly portrayed in the governess’ conception of the children as beautiful and innocent at first, and ugly and evil in the end. Fryer states that the governess sees herself as the one who will provide direction for the lost children and thus earning for herself the admiration of the master. Mrs. Grose, for her part, seems to be jealous of the governess’ authority and encourages her fantasies so as to drive her mad. Fryer believes that Mrs. Grose opts not to tell her master about Quint and Miss. Jessel’s affair in order to have complete control of the children.

I completely agree with Fryer’s point of view. In my opinion, the governess’ arrival is a stumbling block for Mrs. Grose in her ambition to be the master’s eyes at Byrd. For this reason, and considering the governess’ innocence and inexperience, Mr. Grose decides to embark the young lady on a quest that leads her into madness. I also believe that the master’s flirtatious attitude exacerbates the governess’ innate possessive behaviour, especially towards Flora and Miles.

Cranfill and Clark

Cranfill and Clark focus on the psychopathology of the governess. Cranfill and Clark believe that the governess’s madness comes from a great desire to be a hero in the eyes of the employer. By protecting the kids against supernatural forces, she may conquer the employer’s heart.

Cranfill and Clark also mention the governess’s sexual repression that may come from  Calvinist´principles. She is constantly thinking that everybody is committing sins. She sees perversion everywhere.

Cranfill and Clark also believe that the housekeeper agrees with the governess only because Mrs Grose does not understand what the governess says. She has a very basic vocabulary, and in order not to show she is inferior she may prefer to agree.

Cranfill and Clark also state that the governess’s allusions has to do with lack of sleep, so much reading and the expectation of seeing a ghost.

I find these critics very suitable. I totally agree with Cranfill and Clark´s critics. The governess is mad, and her desires to conquer the employer made her imagine things that had never existed in real life, they had only existed in her mind.

Harold C. GODDARD

Harold C. GODDARD

Goddard's essay is considered the most important criticism before Wilson's famous article. Although his article was not published until 1957, his daughter claims he wrote it in 1920, so he is given the credit for being the first to expound a hallucination theory of the story.

In his interpretation Goddard doesn´t employ psychoanalytic terminology, or refer to psychoanalytic literature, but he makes a thoughtful reading of the text itself, he "reads between the lines" and relies on common sense to make a psychological analysis and discover what the characters thought or how they felt.

Goddard says: "When a young person, especially a young woman, falls in love and circumstances forbid the normal growth and confession of the passion, the emotion, dammed up, overflows in a psychical experience, a daydream, or internal drama which the mind creates in lieu of the thwarted realization in the objective world... “

In his criticism, he tries to explain how the governess gathers incomplete pieces of information (about the children, the former guardians, etc.) and creates a story in which she is the heroine who acts with courage to save the children for the man she loves but cannot possess. The governess’s hallucinations are combined with Mrs. Grose ignorance and superstition, especially in the ambiguous scenes in which the ghosts of Mr. Quint and Ms. Jessel are "identified".

Goddard also points out that, as well as the governess hallucination has got a “creative logic”, James also employs “creative logic" as a strategy to make the story credible to the reader, more credible than most stories of the supernatural because readers, even if not consciously, can perceive the real plot: two children in the care of of an insane woman.

In his own words: " he hypnotizes us into forgetting that it is the governess' version of the story to which we are listening, and lures us, as the governess unconsciously lured Mrs. Grose, into accepting her coloring of the facts for the facts themselves."  James makes readers forget that there are no facts, only the governess’s own assertions, that support the existence of the ghostly visions that are a threat to the children.

Goddard believes the story is “susceptible of various readings”. His essay contains very detailed examples that support the hallucination theory and provides bases for readings which combine psychoanalytic, theological, and sociological considerations. That’s why the essay is one of the most outstanding critical responses to The Turn of the Screw in the period prior to Edmund Wilson's famous essay.

When I first read the story I was “hypnotized” (as Goddard suggested) by Henry James and I bought the “ghost story”. However, I felt something was wrong, I couldn´t understand why the ghosts were a threat to Miles and Flora.  After I read Goddard’s criticism, I agreed with his hallucination theory since he provides several examples to support the non-apparitionist view. What’s more, I realized that I couldn´t see the corruption in the ghosts because they were only in the governess’s mind. In the end,  I felt a bit disappointed by the non-apparitionist view because I’m fond of terror and ghosts stories, but I could see that the true value of the story lies in its ambiguity.

Muriel G. Shine

Muriel G. Shine attempted to interpret the Turn of the Screw through several perspectives.

One of them is the fact of holding that the story is concerned with how unethical it is for a person to act when he or she is guided by a totally unreliable knowledge about reality. This can be applied when taking into account the governess’ perception in the story. While other authors argue that the apparitions are real and that she makes a great effort to act in the best way she can to deal with them, Shine on the other hand, argues that the governess embodies all the wrong characteristics for a person to gain knowledge from different life circumstances.

Shine claims that a vital part of this quest for knowledge is to firstly gain knowledge about oneself and recognizing one’s flaws and defects. This is in fact the kind of insight that the governess fails to make throughout this story, as she is not aware of the possible danger and the seriousness of her distorted perceptions of reality. This inability to reflect upon the nature of her perceptions has a terrible consequence in both children: that of forcing them to “see” what she sees and to expose them on her perverse knowledge. What children finally get to see are not the perceptions themselves, but the governess’ corrupted personality.

Shine also sees the governess from a psychoanalytic perspective. She argues that the governess is characterized as a manipulative adolescence, and this can be appreciated in her unrealistic idealization of the children’s guardian, whom she only saw twice, and her constant desire to manipulate Miles and to submit him under her control.

Lastly, Shine exposes her reader-response criticism in that she claims that this kind of criticism depends upon the analysis of the text itself as a kind of place where something is missing, inviting readers to retrieve these gaps  from their different psychological perspectives.

I must say that I really enjoyed reading Shine’s analysis of the Turn of the Screw, in that I could see that all the things that she claimed about the story are really accurate and totally proven. I could totally feel identified with her analysis, since from very first moment I started reading the novel, I noticed that the narrator’s perspective, that of the governess, had not be relied on at all.  

Wilson, 1934

                                  Apparitionists vs Non-apparitionists
Wilson, 1934
Edmund Wilson (1895-1972) was an American writer, literary and social critic.
In his essay "The Ambiguity of Henry James"Wilson favours the non-apparitionist perspective. He states that the ghosts are not real ghosts, but just the governess's hallucinations.
 He finds significance in the fact that only the governess sees the ghosts. Anybody but the governess admits seeing the ghosts. The governess thinks that the children also see the ghosts  but there is no proof that they actually do. The housekeeper, Mrs Grose, insists that she doesn't see them.
One of the arguments for an apparitionist interpretation is that when the governess gives a decription of what she saw to Mrs Grose, the housekeeper says that the description coincides with the appearance of Quint. Wilson's answer to this argumentation is that Mrs Grose has been inatentive to the governess's description and that she rapidely arrives at the conclusion that the apparition was Quint. Wilson suggests that the master and Quint may have been similar in appearance (in fact, Quint wore the master's clothes), so that the governess, in describing her daydream turned real, she might have described Quint.

Christine Brooke-Rose

Christine Brooke-Rose is a structuralist critic who attempted to understand the “The Turn of the Screw” through a detailed study of the ambiguity embedded in the linguistic structures, which for her is the essence of this text.

Christine distinguishes between “STORY” – the events as they occurred- and “DISCOURSE” – how the events are presented. This concepts are equivalents to the Russian Formalists’ distinction between fabula (histoire) and Sjuzvet (discours) (Lodge, Modern Literary Theory, Ch 9). Brooke-Rose states that there is ambiguity since within the story or sjuzvet , there are two “fabulas”, one taking the apparitionist and the other taking the non-apparirionist interpretation.

Christine distinguishes between BARE (basic structure)and MIRROR (reflections of the basic structure) STRUCTURES. The two fabulas belong to the bare structure, which is the basic structure of the text. The mirror structure refers to “a set of reflecting dichotomies suggestive of reflections in a mirror”. What we see in a mirror depends on our emotional and physical state. This leads us to think that ghosts are portrayed depending on the governess’ emotional states. Brooke-Rose also calls it mirror because mirrors have a four- sided frame and the story can be particularly analysed taking into account six groups of four elements:

·         4 main living characters at Bly: the governess, Mrs. Grose, Miles, Flora.

·         4 ex-guardians: the uncle, Mrs Grose, Peter Quint, Miss Jessel

·         4 presently concerned with the children: the governess, Mrs Grose, Peter Quint, Miss Jessel.

·         4 in a supposed evil relationship: Peter Quint, Miss Jessel, Miles, Flora

·         4 narrators: Griffin, Douglas, the I-narrator, the governess

·         4 readers or receptors: Douglas, the I-narrator, the listeners at Douglas’s country home, the readers of the novella

 Brooke-Rose based her studies, mainly, on the language used by the Governess.

She claims that the governess’ language is “contagious”. This means that she is constantly trying to convince the reader to perceive what she herself perceives, which is also achieved by the governess’ exteriorization of her feelings. The story confronts the reader with a whole special world, which at first he/she is an external spectator but to which he/she later becomes internal through perception.

The use of verbs like “give, offer, take, have” together with the frequent use of the possessive pronoun “my” and the occasional use of “we” or “our” suggests that the governess speaks as if she was the owner and possessor of information. Examples of the use of pronouns and verbs are:  “my children”; “my document”; “my boy”.

This critic’s weakness is to assume that there are only two fabulas in the sjuzvet.

To sum up, I must admit that although it was not easy for me to easily understand Brooke-Rose’s point of view at first, after giving her interpretation various readings, I agree with her because if we pay attention to the governess’ language we can easily be persuaded or, at least, influenced by her way of seeing things, especially the ghosts. She is very successful at making us – readers- perceive what she herself perceives.