THE FRIENDS OF THE FRIENDS: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE GHOSTS OF HENRY JAMES
“The Friends of the Friends” (originally titled “The Way It Came”) predates “The Turn of the Screw” by a year and yet it works as not only a preparation but also a key to understanding its successor. If “The Turn of the Screw” exemplifies the ghost story in the hands of Henry James, “The Friends of the Friends” offers a revealing insight into how the author thinks of ghosts. “The Turn of the Screw” has fascinated readers for over a century and the debate over whether the ghosts are literal manifestations or products of the mind of a disturbed child and a sexually repressed governess rages on. While “The Friends of the Friends” doesn’t offer a definitive answer to the question that has haunted literary scholars and fans of Henry James for decades, it does offer both the most relevant insight and the strongest clue in how to seek the answer. “The Friends of the Friends” is a far simpler narrative than “Turn of the Screw”. Neither the main narrator, a woman of society, and her two...