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A review by justinkhchen
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
3.0
3.5 stars
The rating on this one is a little tricky, while I didn't wholeheartedly enjoy the book, I'm glad I now have this classic under my belt, and can start picking up its influence on later work in the genre.
I will confess I did have to occasionally refer to SparkNotes, as the prose can get a little dense. Despite its novella length, it is not a book you can hastily devour, one due to its ornate, antiquated writing style, the other is that it is deliberately slow and convoluted: The Turn of the Screw really digs deep into unraveling the psyche of the governess, at her attempt at trying to cope and resolve the unnatural incidents at Bly.
This is a prime example where the discussion followed is more intriguing than the actual story. Henry James had crafted a perfectly ambiguous tale, where character action and incident can be interpreted on face value, or metaphorically. There are already tons of critics trying to 'solve' the mystery (I particularly enjoy the one from The New Yorker, by Brad Leithauser), but I like to think that both interpretations are equally valid.
At the end, reading The Turn of the Screw reminds me of reading Shakespeare in high school: not necessarily enjoyable during the process, but in retrospect it opened up my horizon and I appreciate the additional perspective I now have regarding my future reading.
The rating on this one is a little tricky, while I didn't wholeheartedly enjoy the book, I'm glad I now have this classic under my belt, and can start picking up its influence on later work in the genre.
I will confess I did have to occasionally refer to SparkNotes, as the prose can get a little dense. Despite its novella length, it is not a book you can hastily devour, one due to its ornate, antiquated writing style, the other is that it is deliberately slow and convoluted: The Turn of the Screw really digs deep into unraveling the psyche of the governess, at her attempt at trying to cope and resolve the unnatural incidents at Bly.
This is a prime example where the discussion followed is more intriguing than the actual story. Henry James had crafted a perfectly ambiguous tale, where character action and incident can be interpreted on face value, or metaphorically. There are already tons of critics trying to 'solve' the mystery (I particularly enjoy the one from The New Yorker, by Brad Leithauser), but I like to think that both interpretations are equally valid.
At the end, reading The Turn of the Screw reminds me of reading Shakespeare in high school: not necessarily enjoyable during the process, but in retrospect it opened up my horizon and I appreciate the additional perspective I now have regarding my future reading.