The Turn of the Screw

“The story had held us, round the fire, sufficiently breathless, but except the obvious remark that it was gruesome, as on Christmas Eve in an old house a strange tale should essentially be, I remember no comment uttered till somebody happened to note it as the only case he had met in which such a visitation had fallen on a child.” 

This is the first sentence of the novella, and it establishes the gothic atmosphere of both the Prologue and the governess’s narrative. The sentence also grounds the recounting of the governess’s narrative in a classic storytelling setting: it is one of numerous “strange tale[s]” exchanged in a gathering “round the fire.” James himself described his novella as a “shameless potboiler,” and this opening line seemingly confirms that The Turn of the Screw is simply a ghost story and not, as some interpretations would have it, a study of psychosexual conflict.

“‘The story won’t tell,’ said Douglas; ‘not in any literal vulgar way.’”

Douglas corrects the Prologue narrator, who ventures that the governess’s story will tell with whom she was in love. In her narrative the governess confesses she “was carried away” (12) by her employer, but she provides clues suggesting she was also carried away by Miles and was too possessive of him. By dodging questions about his relationship with the governess, Douglas also encourages speculation that she was in love with him. This uncertainty regarding the governess’s love interest contributes to the widespread ambiguity that haunts the novella, making it a “story [that] won’t tell.