An allegory reveals a meaning that is hidden throughout the story. Henry James masters this technique in the novel “The Turn of the Screw”. He uses the characters to reveal a supernatural theme. At the beginning of this novel, the reader finds themselves huddled around a campfire telling horrific tales. When the narrator chimes in with his atrocious tale, the reader feels as if they are in the midst of it all. The reader can feel the insanity of the governess, the evil running through Miles, and even the tense feeling that the ghost brings to the novel. Henry James uses the character's attributes to portray a supernatural theme and shows the power that the ghosts possess over the human mind. As the narrator starts out the twisted story, a new governess enters the house. For her first day on the job, she encounters several strange things. One of them being how unbelievably beautiful the children are. She states this multiple times during the novel. “And the little boy-does he look like her? Is he too so very remarkable?” (James 15). The children's remarkable appearance plays a huge role in the governess going insane. She thinks someone as precious and beautiful as them could not cause any harm, but that view is quickly crushed into non-existence when supernatural events occur. The…show more content… Henry James' story is not horrific because of the insane governess, evil Miles or even the uneasy feelings the ghosts provide. His story is horrific because of the effect the supernatural has on the mind of the living. The real fear is what the ghosts can cause the brain to think or even act upon. The hidden message throughout the story is that our worst fear is our mind, not the things around us. Maybe the governess was truly insane and it was all a figment of her imagination. Miles could possibly be evil since birth, and the ghosts can be a made up imagination by a mentally ill young
