by Henry James

Henry James was born in New York City, the second son of well-to-do, liberal parents. He spent much of his youth traveling in the United States and Europe, an experience that would influence many of his greatest works. After an unsuccessful attempt at writing in the United States, James moved in 1875 to Europe. Settling first in Rome, then Paris, James finally found England most to his liking. He settled in a red-brick house in the community of Rye, in Sussex, England, a home that he had felt destined to lease. He created The Turn of the Screw there between September and December 1897. James carefully set the tale in the 1840s, the decade of his own youth. He used his surroundings for inspiration in his writing, for the house brought back memories of his boyhood, a time when...