The Turn of the Screw
Henry James (1843–1916) is widely regarded as one of the greatest novelists in English of all time. In books such as The Portrait of a Lady and The Ambassadors he explored the clash between the ‘old’ and ‘new’ cultures of Europe and the United States, often through the figure of an American emigrant. As well as the major novels with their extraordinary richness and ambiguity, James wrote stories, novellas and plays, travel books including Italian Hours and The American Scene, and cornerstone works of literary criticism such as The Art of Fiction. James was born in New York; from 1876 he settled in London and from 1897 in Rye, East Sussex, but he continued to visit America. His unique transatlantic perspective and subtle understanding of human character mean that he has long been recognised as a master, and his most famous works – notably The Turn of the Screw – have often been adapted for film, theatre, radio and TV.
Colm Tóibín is an Irish novelist and essayist. His novel The Master (2004) imagined several years in the life of Henry James; it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the Los Angeles Times Novel of the Year Award and the International Dublin Literary Award, among other prizes. Tóibín is originally from County Wexford and was educated in Dublin. Immediately after graduating he left Ireland for Barcelona and his early books were inspired by his time in Spain; later he returned to Dublin and worked as a journalist. In novels such as The Blackwater Lightship and The Story of the Night he explored questions of Irishness, exile and gay identity. His more recent fiction, with historical settings, includes Brooklyn, which won the Costa Novel Award. Tóibín is Irene and Sidney B. Silverman professor of the humanities at Columbia University in New York and chancellor of the University of Liverpool.