James's The Turn of the Screw is considered one of literature's greatest ghost stories. Since its publication in 1898, it has been popular with both critics and the public. For the critics, the debate has always been sharply divided. When it was first published, the issue was whether the tale was artistically sound or a morally objectionable story. Many critics, like an Outlook reviewer, note both: "it is on a higher plane both of conception and art. The story itself is distinctly repulsive." Likewise, a Bookman reviewer notes: "We have never read a more sickening, a more gratuitously melancholy tale. It has all Mr. James's cleverness, even his grace." And a review in the Independent says that, "while it exhibits Mr. James's genius in a powerful light," the book "affects the reader with a disgust that is not to be expressed."

Those who found negative things to...