book data
3508 ratings, 3.56 average rating, 342 reviews
(more data...)
edit
published
June 9th 2003
(first published 1898)
by J'ai Lu
binding
Poche, 156 pages
isbn
2290334839
(isbn13: 9782290334836)
Sign in to Goodreads to see your friends' reviews of this book.
| topics | replies | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turn of the Screw...: The Title... | 5 | 10 | 10/20/2008 05:28AM |
friend reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.
This book is currently not featured on any Listopia lists.
Add this book to your favorite list »
other reviews (showing 1-20 of 4687)
All ratings |
5 stars (657)
|
4 stars (1130)
|
3 stars (1121)
|
2 stars (368)
|
1 star (127)
|
avg 3.56
Read in April, 2007
I absolutely loved this. There is quite a lot of controversy linked with this story, and what was really happening. Was their really evil? Was the Governess mad?
The end is rather inconclusive and leaves the reader to decide for themselves.
I thought it was very compelling and well written. James did a really good job of writing from a young woman’s perspective. Especially at the beginning I found her incredibly endearing and oh-so-GIRLY. Over a hundred years later, and it’s still quit...more
The end is rather inconclusive and leaves the reader to decide for themselves.
I thought it was very compelling and well written. James did a really good job of writing from a young woman’s perspective. Especially at the beginning I found her incredibly endearing and oh-so-GIRLY. Over a hundred years later, and it’s still quit...more
Like this review?
yes
(3 people liked it)
1 comment
Read in April, 2008
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
Like this review?
yes
(2 people liked it)
add a comment
Read in May, 2007
Henry James is tough and I find his text to be pretty convoluted. I have this "joke": the average letter count/word in this book is about 9. Of course, it's not, but I vaguely remember the need to read this book with a dictionary. That probably only makes me less educated.
It's also old, so the ghost story is not at all thrilling or causing a "page-turner" status. The same thing happens over and over again and it's "scary", all to arrive at an ambiguous climax that...more
It's also old, so the ghost story is not at all thrilling or causing a "page-turner" status. The same thing happens over and over again and it's "scary", all to arrive at an ambiguous climax that...more
Like this review?
yes
(2 people liked it)
add a comment
Read in November, 2007
recommends it for:
brit lit fans, people who like psychological readings of texts
Creepy. Twisty-turny. Ghosts. Weird kids. Unreliable, possibly insane narrator. Henry James, is there no genre that you will not poke your head into?
No, really. It's interesting though. On the surface, this story is perfect to curl up by the fire with on a cold winter's night. Which is exactly how the book is framed, by the way. As a story told in front of a fireside on a cold winter's night. It's short, it reads quickly, and is open to pretty much whatever you want to make of it. James let...more
No, really. It's interesting though. On the surface, this story is perfect to curl up by the fire with on a cold winter's night. Which is exactly how the book is framed, by the way. As a story told in front of a fireside on a cold winter's night. It's short, it reads quickly, and is open to pretty much whatever you want to make of it. James let...more
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
Has a copy to sell/swap
—
Read in December, 2007
I would have given this four stars if it weren't for the ending. Maybe I was too tired to grasp exactly what he was trying to get at the end, so I guess I'll have to look it over again.
The first half is really good, then I feel it just doesn't pay off at the end. The tension, or the purported tension, just didn't do enough for me.
(For those of you who've read it, I found it rather interesting that the man who brought the story to the campfire would have been 10 years old when the gover...more
The first half is really good, then I feel it just doesn't pay off at the end. The tension, or the purported tension, just didn't do enough for me.
(For those of you who've read it, I found it rather interesting that the man who brought the story to the campfire would have been 10 years old when the gover...more
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
This "book" does not deserve a star, let alone half of a star, or any portion of any geometric shape whatsoever. It is supposed to be a "ghost" "story" but is neither a story nor is it about ghosts. Nothing ever happens and it's narrated by a persnippety British woman who sounds like she has phlegm caught in her throat. Apparently it's a must for the GRE, but do not be mistaken. It is the most un-literary thing I have ever listened to. And there is no screw.
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
I didn't get it at first. It was part of my Folklore in Literature class. After the discussion, though, I decided I liked it a lot more than the style had led me to believe. No one should write like Henry James, but that doesn't mean one should not read Henry James.
The book has a lot of narrative layers, and borrows heavily from folkloric traditions without exploiting any single story. I don't think it matters if the ghosts are real or not.
The book has a lot of narrative layers, and borrows heavily from folkloric traditions without exploiting any single story. I don't think it matters if the ghosts are real or not.
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
2 comments
Read in August, 2007
Reading Henry James seems to be like swimming through a thick swamp. His verbosity is a double-edged sword. When it is appropriate, it can be beautifully descriptive; when it's not, it borders on pretention and is tedious. His language was my favorite thing about this book, but the story's ambiguity is also wonderful. I think it separates the cynical from the romantic. (Unfortunately, I side more with the cynic.)
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
Read in April, 2000
Henry James' take on the ghost story plays on the psychological, slowly undermining your sense of what is realiable in terms of the narrative. However, as much as some have praised this critically, I never was able to find much suspense in his rather complex and I would say turgid prose. I remember having to read the first sense over at least twice for want of the ability to make head or tail of it.
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
last night i saw the 1961 movie that was based on this story, "the innocents," and the one line that the governess says..."yes, there's something going on here. something secret, and whispery, and... indecent" made me mad to read it.
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
1 comment
Read in March, 2008
This book was excruciatingly verbose -- the story could have been told in 30 pages. Other than that, not a bad tale.
-m
-m
Like this review?
yes
(1 person liked it)
add a comment
Read in November, 2008
Quite good, though so vague sometimes it was slightly boring. Nevertheless, I found it evoking a mood through the days that I read it, and it's left a certain impression once read that is not easy to shake.
The "ghosts" and the ghost-story aspect were very unconventional--not like today's horror movie and not like Poe's or Bierce's darkness. Rather, the effect of the haunting was very psychological; one is in doubt, along with the adults in the novel, whether what is perceived is...more
The "ghosts" and the ghost-story aspect were very unconventional--not like today's horror movie and not like Poe's or Bierce's darkness. Rather, the effect of the haunting was very psychological; one is in doubt, along with the adults in the novel, whether what is perceived is...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in November, 2008
recommends it for:
fans of Lost and Henry James
I picked this up because it was mentioned on Lost, and I've found that books mentioned in the show give hints as to what's going on in the series. Maybe.
I started reading, and realized I'd read it before. No idea when. I might've read it in high school, but I wouldn't swear to it.
It's basically a ghost story. People are sitting around a fire on Christmas Eve, and one of the guests brings up a governess he used to know who had written down her encounters with two ghosts, and th...more
I started reading, and realized I'd read it before. No idea when. I might've read it in high school, but I wouldn't swear to it.
It's basically a ghost story. People are sitting around a fire on Christmas Eve, and one of the guests brings up a governess he used to know who had written down her encounters with two ghosts, and th...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in September, 2008
This is the perfect story to read in October! I started reading it late at night and stayed awake until I had finished it--and even then I didn't sleep well because Quint and Miss Jessel haunted my dreams. The genius of this tale lies in Henry James' ambiguity of purpose. On the surface it can be enjoyed as a traditional ghost story about a governess in a large house protecting her two charges from the evil intents of Miss Jessel and Quint--the ghosts of two former servants who were suspected to...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in September, 2008
recommended to Anca by:
llosa
Cineva zicea (aici: http://rogozanu.blog.cotidianu... )
- si avea dreptate - ca atunci cind citesti clasici si capodoperele lor si nu-ti plac, dai vina pe tine dar daca citesti ceva nou si nu-ti place, dai vina pe autor. Asa si eu acum cu Henry James pe care l-am apucat in biblioteca dupa ce l-am gasit dat de exemplu ca tehnica narativa cu cartea asta in Scrisori catre un tinar romancier....more
- si avea dreptate - ca atunci cind citesti clasici si capodoperele lor si nu-ti plac, dai vina pe tine dar daca citesti ceva nou si nu-ti place, dai vina pe autor. Asa si eu acum cu Henry James pe care l-am apucat in biblioteca dupa ce l-am gasit dat de exemplu ca tehnica narativa cu cartea asta in Scrisori catre un tinar romancier....more
Like this review?
yes
2 comments
Read in July, 2008
This is the first thing I have read of Henry James, and while I understand he is not an author defined or confined by the horror genre, one could easily make the mistaken assumption given such a masterful display of suspense while delivering such a disturbingly luscious scare to the spirit. While the language is cloaked in the formalities of Victorian literature, I found it not only contributed to the eloquence of the subtle psychological conflicts voiced by the narrator, but to the ...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in July, 2008
Classifying 'TTOFTS' as a formulaic ghost story could be forgiven if the narrator's account is treated as gospel; however James instills doubt in the reader noticing the governess' increasingly erratic behavior. James leaves our suspicions whether malicious phantasms are actually haunting the children unresolved, concluding with a passage seemingly implicating the earnest governess in strangulating young Miles.
James' novella is best appreciated for pioneering the use of an unreliable narrat...more
James' novella is best appreciated for pioneering the use of an unreliable narrat...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
I read this one because a book of criticism I’m going to read has a lengthy essay that analyses James’s techniques and several critical responses. Interesting how James reinforces the ambiguity by beginning with what appears to be a frame, although it turns out not to be one because the narrative within the narrative is not enclosed at the end. Early on James creates narrative tension by sticking close to the protagonist’s thought processes, even in the midst of scenes. This strategy is pa...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in January, 2005
So I did give this a reread because I was intrigued by the governess as crazy approach that seems to be taken for granted. Again, I did not get that feeling. I do feel that she is perhaps being driven mad by the ghosts or, even possibly, by diabolical young children. And I do think she gets obsessive and neurotic as the sexually repressed, socially disadvantaged woman of her day did do under similar strains (the life of a governess was a special kind of hell all its own.) But I also think th...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
Read in January, 2002
recommends it for:
Fans of supernatural fiction
By classifying this book as supernatural fiction, of course, I've already made my interpretive stance (which is based on having read the book twice --once as a college student in the early 70s, and more recently after becoming aware of the revisionist theory, to see whether I'd missed anything the first time) clear; I view this as a straightforward story of a ghostly haunting, and the governess as exactly what James makes a point of establishing her to be at the outset, a trustworthy narrator. ...more
Like this review?
yes
add a comment
to-read
(on 737 people's shelves)
classics (on 165 people's shelves)
currently-reading (on 162 people's shelves)
fiction (on 118 people's shelves)
horror (on 37 people's shelves)
classic (on 32 people's shelves)
literature (on 18 people's shelves)
1001 (on 18 people's shelves)
mystery (on 17 people's shelves)
favorites (on 14 people's shelves)
More shelves...
classics (on 165 people's shelves)
currently-reading (on 162 people's shelves)
fiction (on 118 people's shelves)
horror (on 37 people's shelves)
classic (on 32 people's shelves)
literature (on 18 people's shelves)
1001 (on 18 people's shelves)
mystery (on 17 people's shelves)
favorites (on 14 people's shelves)
More shelves...
