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The Golden Bowl, or actually,The Turn of the Screw (in lieu of The Golden Bowl) ()


Modern Library Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century (32)

It would be cruel and unusual punishment to actually trudge through the three Henry James novels that made the top 100.  I did read The Ambassadors and sort of want to read The Wings of the Dove, but instead of The Golden Bowl, here's a review of the one thing he wrote that I actually liked--The Turn of the Screw.  In this virtual horror tale the twisted emotional dementia that mars his other works actually aids the tale.

A young governess is hired to look after two seemingly angelic orphans--Flora and Miles.  Seemingly, but why was Miles dismissed from school?  and who are the strangers who the governess sees at windows?  As in most of James' work, these questions are raised but not answered. However, in this novella he is presenting a gothic mystery, so the open ended questions are appropriate.

Apparently Turn of the Screw was controversial when James wrote it, because of it's presentation of children as potentially wicked.  In the era of Littleton, I don't think there's anyone left who will argue that children are incapable of evil.

It's just a good creepy little tale.

(Reviewed:)

Grade: (B)


Websites:

Henry James Links:

    -WIKIPEDIA: Henry James
    -ENTRY: Henry James (Famous Authors)
    -ENTRY: Henry James (New World Encyclopedia)
    -ENTRY: Henry James, American writer (Leon Edel, Encyclopaedia Britannica)
    -ENTRY: Washington Square (Encyclopaedia Britannica)
    -The Henry James Review (Project muse)
    -
   
-PODCAST: Episode 207: The Bostonians by Henry James: (HOSTED BY JOHN J. MILLER, December 7, 2021, Great Books)
    -PODCAST: On Henry James’s Very Long Short Story (From the History of Literature Podcast with Jacke Wilson, LitHub)
    -ESSAY: The Best of Henry James (Susan L. Mizruchi July 23, 2021, The Millions)
    -ESSAY: More than a Matter of Taste: The danger of relegating beauty to the trivial pursuit of pleasure. (Joshua Hren, 6/02/21, Hedgehog Review)
    -ESSAY: The Top 10 Henry James Novels (Michael Gorra, Aug 24, 2012, Publishers Weekly)
    -ESSAY: Henry James and the American Idea: The Atlantic Monthly helped establish the expatriate author as a literary great (Susan Goodman, July/August 2011, Humanities)
    -
   
-ESSAY: Why The Turn of the Screw Haunts Us 125 Years Later: “That queasy opacity is at the heart of the novella’s power... The reader is never sure what, exactly, is happening.” (Kate Griffin, June 5, 2023, LitHub)
    -ESSAY: Henry and Louis: An unlikely literary friendship (Max Byrd, November 18, 2021, American Scholar)
    -ESSAY: Henry James and the Joys of Confusion: On James’ The Golden Bowl (Dick Turner, 8/26/22, Splice Today)
    -ESSAY: The High Altar of Henry James: What’s implicit in Henry James’ works is his familiarity with matters Catholic. What’s implicit is also subtle, so that Protestant and Catholic readers alike might enjoy reading about such matters. (Daniel J. Sundahl, January 3rd, 2022, Imaginative Conservative)
    -REVIEW: of The American by Henry James (Complete Review)
    -REVIEW: of Turn of the Screw< by Henry James/a> (Micah Mattix, The Spectator)
   
-ESSAY: On the Most Adapted Ghost Story of All Time: Adam Scovell Looks Into the Cinematic Appeal of Henry James’s Turn of the Screw (Adam Scovell, 12/20/21, LitHub)
    -ESSAY: What Henry James can teach us about the culture wars: The author understood the dangerous allure of the romantic reactionary (Sameer Rahim, January 3, 2022, Prospect)
    -REVIEW: of The Aspern Papers by Henry James (Elizabeth Lowry, TLS)
    -
   
-REVIEW: of The Tragic Muse by Henry James (Complete Review)


FILM:

    -FILM REVIEW: The Bostonians (Paddy Mulholland, Spectrum Culture)

Book-related and General Links:
    -Henry James on the Web
    -ONLINE STUDYGUIDE:  The Turn of the Screw by Henry James (SparkNote by Selena Ward)
    -Turn of the Screw (e-text)
    -REVIEW: of Henry James: A Life in Letters (New Statesman)