A picture image display apparatus has a flat type vacuum enclosure having a transparent face panel. A row of parallelly disposed linear thermionic cathodes are provided with an electron beam extractor electrode which produces a predetermined number of two dimensionally disposed electron beams out of the electron emission from the linear thermionic cathodes. A row of control electrodes is disposed parallelly in a direction perpendicular to those of the linear thermionic cathodes. A row of vertical deflection electrodes and a row of horizontal deflection electrodes are provided. A phosphor screen formed on the inner force of the face panel has an anode of thin metal film formed on its surface. A horizontal deflection signal generator issues a horizontal deflection signal having, in 1 cycle, a first scanning period wherein voltage increases and a second scanning period of the same length wherein voltage decreases. In both of the first and second scanning periods control signals are applied to the control electrodes to produce image spots in both scanning periods.