Essay On The Governess In Henry James's Turn Of The Screw
The governess wants to help the people of Bly, but unfortunately has some sort of mental illness or problem. She isn’t completely sane. In Henry James’s Turn of the Screw, the governess watches over the children, and when things don’t go her way, she conjures in her imagination two ghosts that haunt them. These ghosts are unseen by the others, Ms. Grose and the children, Miles and Flora, but are seen vividly by the governess. Though the governess believes the ghosts to be the conflict of the story, there truly is no harm coming to the kids, except in fact the governess herself. The author, writing from the Governess’s point of view, provides various questions to the reader that are left ambiguous, and the reader must decide what to believe and not to believe.
At the beginning of the story, the governess adores the children. She believes them to be the most perfect children to ever live. She speaks of how beautiful they are, “But it was a comfort that there could be no uneasiness in a connection
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She is longing for the one person she desires, the person she came to Bly for, the Master. She instead finds the man with red hair. When she catches sight of him, she is baffled and says “He did stand there! —but high up, beyond the lawn and at the very top of the tower to which, on that first morning, little Flora had conducted me” (15). The author does not directly state who the man is, if he truly is a man, or if he is a ghost. It is not presented to the reader until Ms. Grose reveals him to be Peter Quint, a man who worked at the house of Bly, but passed away at an earlier point in time. This presents a choice to the reader, to follow the Governess’s story and believe what she is saying, or to believe that she is unstable. It is not known to the reader for sure what the truth is. The quote also provides an early insight that the children will be aligned with the ghosts, as she connects Peter Quint with
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