Oh boy, a ghost story! However, this isn’t the average spooky tale. While reading chapters 1-10, I’ve noticed many of the same social expectations and gender roles that were also present in Tess of the d’Urbervilles. This post will focus on (some of) the similarities that James Hardy and Henry James share in their respective works.
One of the first similarities in Turn of the Screw appears in the very first chapter, when Douglas is explaining the relationship between the “former governess” and the “prospective patron” (26). Just as Alec d’Urberville ultimately ended up taking control over and persuading Tess to marry him, Peter Quint (as we learn his identity later in the story) does the same thing to Miss Jessel. Douglas remarks that Miss Jessel “was succumbed to…the seduction exercised by the splendid young man” (30). Here, James is relaying the same social role as Hardy – men are supposed to woo women and seduce them in order to get them to marry them. In other words, women are merely pawns for men to use in order to obtain happiness and ultimately, more property (as women were often thought of in the time period of this book).
Another similarity that Turn and Tess share is the use of environment to establish clear differences in scenes, moods of the characters, and plot events. In Tess almost all of the terrible things that happened to her (Prince dying, the rape by Alec, etc.) happen during nighttime. This is an example of Hardy using environmental elements to link events together and to add an impending sense of helplessness in Tess’s situation; she obviously cannot prevent nighttime from happening, therefore she cannot prevent those awful events from occurring. In James’s case, he also uses the environment of the story to add intensity to the events and to create a common theme in which the events (so far) all take place in some aspect of nature. For example, the first time The Governess encounters the ghost of Peter Quint, she is strolling along outside the house, and after she just leaves the woods, she sees his ghost “high up, beyond the lawn at the very top of the tower” (39). Similarly, when she first encounters Miss Jessel, The Governess is sitting in some sort of grove alongside the edge of “the Sea of Azof” (54). The final ghost sighting of this chapter happens “on the lawn” of the Bly estate, when The Governess sees “a figure in the grounds”, and ends rather abruptly, when “poor little Miles” is discovered as “the presence on the lawn” (71,72). These ghost sightings and their settings are incredibly important as they mimic Hardy’s use of environment to clue the reader in to when a bad event may occur in the plot.
One of the questions that arose for me while reading this selection pertained to James’s use of the environment as a signal for an event: will this continue as the story moves along? I also am curious to see how James’s characterization of the Governess will develop: will she be thought of as “crazy” or “mad” for seeing these apparitions? I want to think positively but Hardy has taught me to not get my hopes up…
