The Governess's Blues Character Analysis

Observe that there is never any evidence that anybody but the governess sees the ghosts. She believes that the children see them but there is never any proof that they do. The governess believes the children are misbehaving, but the children are not ever seen necessarily behaving badly. Any behavioral changes they do exhibit are in response to the strain caused by the governess's ever-increasing strange behavior and emotional outbursts. The governess allows her affections and emotions to control her, and in the end, it costs Miles, the boy, his life. Her affection for the children can be very intense. When she first meets the children, she thinks they are perfect and adorable. She has tendency of hugging and kissing them repeatedly. For example,

Young Miles, who stays with the governess after Flora departs, has also been affected by the emotional governess. The physical state of Miles throughout the final scene suggests to the reader that the governess's behavior is having a dangerous effect on the boy. The sweating, hard breathing, and weakness she describes begin even before she tells the boy that Quint is present. When Quint shows up the final time, the governess shrieks when he appears in the window. She tells Miles that he is at the window, but like his sister and Mrs. Grose, Miles cannot see the ghost either. He shouts, "Peter Quint - you devil!" but then yells "Where?" (102) because he cannot see him. And the governess's physical actions during this scene border on the violent - grasping and holding the boy and even shaking him. When the boy dies in her arms, the governess believes he has died of fear, but fear did not kill the boy. It was her own reaction to the ghost that causes her to accidently smother him as she held him in her arms. Her mental instability is obvious at the end of the story, after Miles death, when she proclaims his spirit “dispossessed” (103). She feels has if she has managed to save Mile’s from the evil desire of the