JamesF-L is the on-line discussion group concerning Henry James.
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Here is a sample posting by Adrian Cox to JamesF-L about "The Turn
of the Screw."
For Vanessa VanGilson's and Casey Abell's replies to Adrian Cox,
use the following links:
Date: Sun, 1 Nov 1998
From: Adrian Cox (adrianscox@CSI.COM)
Subject: The Screw of The Innocents
I gather there is a widespread view that The Turn of The Screw was written to be intentionally ambiguous about whether the children were evil or the governess was mad.
I've just watched Jack Clayton's film, THE INNOCENTS, which was shown the other night on Channel 4 here in the UK. This interpretation leaves the viewer in little doubt that Deborah Kerr is not quite the full shilling.
Would any list member care to comment on the argument that tale was not only a portrayal of a progressive mental disorder culminating in a full-blown psychosis, but also a deliberate satire on Victorian morals? The genteelness of the governess was the product of an upbringing in a 'very good middle-class family', but a family background which, rather than giving her a 'good start', was probably much responsible for the marked vulnerability of her personality. Deborah Kerr from an early point in the film seems particularly conscious of sex in a salacious way. (Join the club, Debs!) I'm not sure if the words are lifted from the James's short story but at one point of particular intensity Miles calls his governess a 'hussy' and a 'dirty-minded hag'. And yet she was a country parson's daughter!
How could one defend Victorian morals if they were partly responsible for the destruction of all that was so delightful at Bly? Might Henry James have been telling us that?
Adrian Cox