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Contents

Part 1: Introduction (Page 3 – 4)

Part 2: Chapter summaries (Page 5 – 17)

Part 3: The author (Page 19 – 21)

Part 4: The novel (Page 22 – 24)

Part 5: The setting (Page 25 – 28)

Part 6: The context (Page 29 – 32)

Part 7: Character analysis – Dr. Henry Jekyll (Page 33 – 35)

Part 8: Character analysis – Mr. Edward Hyde (Page 36 – 39)

Part 9: Character analysis – Mr. Utterson (Page 40 – 41)

Part 10: Stevenson’s use of language (Page 42 – 46)

Part 11: Stevenson’s use of structure & form (Page 46 – 52)

Part 12: Sample questions & answers (Page 52 – 67)

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 Part 1: Introduction

There are some stories that stay in peoples’ collective

consciousness forever - they don’t seem to go away. Often they are
stories with core morals and messages: things that concern humanity
generation after generation. The novel that this guide will look at, The
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, is one of these stories. Written
by Robert Louis Stevenson during the nineteenth century, the story is
one of the most famous of the Victorian period and persists to the
current day. The name of the novel, in fact, has almost become
synonymous with the idea of someone having two sides - a good one
and a bad one.
At the time of its publication, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr
Hyde became an instant classic. Shocking in its subject matter but also
incredibly well written, the novel was read widely and, it is said, by
everyone from those who didn’t normally read fiction to the Queen
herself. To this day there are new television and movie adaptations
being made of the story - it’s clearly one that has interested people
for well over 100 years and shows no signs of going out of fashion
soon. To date there have been over 123 film versions of the story, not
to mention numerous stage and radio adaptations.
For a story that appears so familiar that many of us feel we know it
before even opening the book, what are the reasons for reading
Stevenson’s original text? As you will see from this guide, there is a
whole host of interesting themes, ideas and contexts at work
underneath the seemingly straightforward reading of the novel. It
explores in detail, in a way that was utterly shocking for its
contemporary Victorian audience, the idea of the human being
comprising more than one personality, that there is both good and
evil lurking in men and that, sometimes, we are unable to control
these competing qualities.
As well as addressing a number of interpretations of the events in
the story, contextual features and the setting of the novel, in this guide
I will aim to give you everything you need to be able to discuss the

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language, structure and characters of The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll
and Mr Hyde. I hope you find it useful!

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Part 2: Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1 – The story of the door

In this, the opening chapter of the story, we are introduced to the
character of Mr Utterson. Mr Utterson is a lawyer who, it is pointed
out, is very reliable. We are told about how he is very understanding
of other people and is very slow to judge them. We also learn that he
is loyal and very careful about who he becomes friends with.
Mr Utterson goes out walking every Sunday with a cousin of his, a Mr
Richard Enfield, and it is on one of these walks that they happen to
wander down a side-street in a busy area of London. It is a very
attractive area where all the residents are quite wealthy and
successful. This is disturbed by a building, which is described as
“sinister”. It is described as being neglected and, on the outside, its
doorways frequented by tramps and gangs of children.
Upon seeing this building, Enfield tells Utterson of a story about how,
one night at three in the morning, he was walking home and he began
to get an eerie sensation, a feeling that something was not right. All of
a sudden, he saw two figures running towards each other from
separate streets. One was a small man and the other a girl of around
eight-years-old. When the two come upon each other, Enfield tells us,
the man calmly tramples the young girl without even stopping.
He continues the story telling the reader and Utterson how a crowd
gathered and how, for some “unnatural” reason, everyone took a
severe dislike to this man. He appears to inspire a vicious hatred in
the hearts and faces of all the people gathered around. Enfield
repeatedly makes reference to how the man sneered and looked at
everyone. Enfield and a doctor who stops by to help the girl both
promise to ruin the man’s reputation around town unless he pays £100
to the girl’s family – a huge amount in those days.
The man agrees and goes in through the door of the building that
Enfield had pointed out to Utterson on their walk. He returns with gold
and a cheque to bring the sum to £100. Enfield doesn’t trust the man –
he recognizes the name that has been signed on the cheque although

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he won’t mention it to Utterson. Not trusting the man, Enfield, the
doctor and the child’s father accompany him to the bank in the
morning. It turns out the cheque is genuine, leading Enfield to believe
that this man was blackmailing the man whose name is on the cheque,
a man he believes to be of the highest reputation. As a result, he tells
Utterson that he has come to refer to the house as “Black Mail House”.
Utterson asks Enfield why he never investigated the matter to which
Enfield replies – the more suspicious it looks, the less questions he
asks. He mentions that he has observed the house on a number of
occasions but has seen no one going in or out except for the man in
his story. He also mentions that someone must be living there
although it’s difficult to tell where one house begins and another ends
in that part of the street.
Finally, Utterson asks Enfield the name of the man from his story and
Enfield tells him that it was a Mr Hyde. When asked to describe him,
Enfield says that he’s difficult to describe, that there is something
“wrong” with his appearance, that he’s “down-right detestable” but
that he can’t remember anything else.
Meanwhile, Utterson has managed to figure out who this other person
is, the one whose name Enfield didn’t want to mention, the man he
believes is being blackmailed. Utterson asks Enfield to tell him if
there were any untruths in his tale. Enfield, slightly offended, says
there were not. They both agree not to speak of the matter ever again.

Chapter 2 – Search for Mr Hyde

Utterson returns to his home where he lives alone but is troubled by
the matter Enfield has told him about. He’s unable to enjoy his dinner
or his after-dinner reading. Unable to settle, he goes to his safe and
from it takes Dr Jekyll’s will. We learn that although he has it in his
possession, Utterson did not help Dr Jekyll prepare it. The will makes
Mr Edward Hyde the beneficiary in the event of Dr Jekyll’s death and,
what’s more, it also stipulates that should Dr Jekyll be missing for a

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period of at least three months, Mr Hyde should step into his shoes
and inherit his wealth.
We learn that Utterson has long had misgivings over the will as he
does not see it as normal and, following Enfield’s story, he now
believes that there is something much more sinister going on. He gets
his coat and heads off to see a friend of both he and Dr Jekyll’s: Dr
Lanyon. Dr Lanyon is a man with a great reputation and Utterson
decides that if anyone knows how to proceed it will be him.
When he arrives, the butler brings him straight in to see Dr Lanyon,
despite the late hour. Dr Lanyon is a healthy man and appears at the
prime of his life. There is a genuine friendship between the two men
and we learn that they share this bond with Dr Jekyll also. However,
Dr Lanyon and Dr Jekyll have had a disagreement of some sort and
haven’t spoken much in ten years. Lanyon admits that he keeps an
eye on him and that their disagreement was on some point of science.
Utterson asks him if he’s ever heard of Hyde but Lanyon has not.
Utterson returns home but the matter still troubles him and all night
he dreams of the story that Enfield told him, all the while being
unable to see the man’s face. It is from this moment that Utterson
begins to hang around the side streets near the door in the hope of
seeing Hyde.
Eventually all his snooping pays off and one night he sees who he
thinks is Hyde. The area has gone very quiet and it becomes
altogether frightening and eerie – similar to when Enfield was
walking the streets before seeing Hyde himself. Even at a distance,
Utterson has almost a physical reaction of revulsion to Mr Hyde. He
approaches him and, addressing him by name, asks if he can be
admitted to see Dr Jekyll. Hyde says Jekyll is not at home and asks
how Utterson knew who he was. Utterson asks if he can see Hyde’s
face first and then he says that at least this way he will know him again
in the future. Hyde asks him again how he knew him and he says from
a friend’s description. Hyde demands to know who and Utterson says
they have Dr Jekyll in common and Hyde reacts angrily saying Jekyll

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would never have told Utterson anything about him and rushes into
the house with a savage laugh.
Utterson is left standing outside the old door confused and with an
increasingly bad opinion of Hyde. He begins to fear for his friend and
calls around to the front of the house where Poole, the house servant,
admits him to the hall and he sits by the fire. Poole returns shortly
afterwards saying that Dr Jekyll has gone out. Utterson questions
Poole about Hyde and he learns that all the staff have orders to obey
Hyde and that he comes and goes as he pleases.
Utterson leaves the house and returns to his own with a heavy heart
and full of worry for his friend. He reasons that Jekyll must have done
something as a young man that Hyde is now blackmailing him about.
He thinks for a while about the foolish things young men do and how
they could easily come back to haunt older men. His biggest worry at
this stage, however, is that if Hyde were to learn of the will then he
may become impatient and something very bad indeed may happen
to Dr Jekyll.

Chapter 3 – Dr. Jekyll was quite at ease

The story skips forward two weeks and a group is having dinner with
Dr Jekyll at his home and Utterson is present. He makes sure to stay
behind after everyone else has left and this, we are told, is nothing
new. Utterson is well-liked and often his hosts would like to keep him
late talking after others had departed.
It is during this conversation that Utterson reminds Jekyll of the will he
has in his possession and how much he disapproves of it. Jekyll laughs
him off and tries to change the subject but when Utterson mentions
that he’s been gathering information about Hyde, Jekyll grows pale
and his face changes. He becomes sharp and tells Utterson that he is
in a very strange and difficult situation and that it cannot be fixed by
talking.
Utterson begs him to come clean promising to help him but Jekyll
says that, though he appreciates the offer, it really isn’t that serious a

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situation and promises Utterson that, should he wish, he could be rid
of Hyde at a moment’s notice.
Utterson takes his word on this but, before he leaves, Jekyll asks him
to help Hyde when Jekyll himself is gone, as a personal favour.
Utterson, while saying he can’t pretend to like him, agrees to Jekyll’s
request.

Chapter 4 – The Carew murder case

Again, the story skips forward, this time to a year later. This chapter
opens with the description of a terrible crime that, because the victim
is a wealthy and high-status individual, shakes London to its core. The
details of the case are related through the only eye-witness – a maid
who was sitting at her window. We learn that there was a full moon
and it was almost unnaturally bright. She sees a very handsome
gentleman walking one way on the street and, towards him, a smaller
man.
They come together and speak under her window. The handsome
gentleman, who we are told had white hair, was very polite to the
smaller man and it appears there was a request for directions. The
maid watched the fine gentleman and admired him as he spoke
before she laid eyes on the second man.
She recognized Hyde immediately as someone who had visited her
master and someone she immediately disliked. She also notices that
he holds a heavy cane in his hand. She reports that Hyde did not
speak a word in return to the gentleman but in a rage, clubs him with
the cane and proceeds to beat him to death.
She faints and, when she wakes, she calls the police, by which time
Hyde has escaped. When the scene is investigated, they find some
gold upon the victim and a letter that is addressed to Mr Utterson as
well as half of the stick Hyde had been carrying.

The letter is taken to Utterson that morning and, once he opens it, he
refuses to say another word until he has seen the body. Once he has,

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he identifies the victim as Sir Danvers Carew, a well-to-do gentleman.
The police, realizing how much of a fuss will be created, ask Utterson
if he can help in finding the culprit at which point Utterson is shown
the half of the cane and recognizes it as Jekyll’s. He takes the police to
Hyde’s address in Soho but he is not there. His landlady says that he
had returned very late and left again. There was nothing strange in it,
she said, because he had very peculiar habits. It is also at this stage
that we learn how much Hyde stands to inherit should anything
happen to Jekyll – a quarter of a million pounds. An incredible amount
of money in the 19th century (let alone today).
When Utterson and the police look around his rooms, they notice that
everything has been decorated and furnished in very good taste but
also that it has recently been ransacked. Pockets in clothes are turned
inside out and they find the charred remains of a cheque book in the
fire as well as the other half of the stick behind a door. The policeman
is delighted and says all they have to do is wait at the bank for him to
try to make a withdrawal and they will have their man. The only
difficulty is that so very few people have seen Hyde’s face. In fact the
only thing that people who have seen him agree on is the feeling of
evil, disgust and revulsion that he inspires in them.

Chapter 5 – Incident of the letter

Utterson turns up at Jekyll’s house in the afternoon and is shown in by
Poole. He is in a part of the house that he’s not been in before – a part
that used to be an anatomical lecture hall where students would watch
surgeons perform autopsies and learn from the practice. For Jekyll,
we learn he was more interested in chemicals, so much of the area is
used as storage and its emptiness gives Utterson an eerie feeling.
They pass through this area up to Jekyll’s chambers and Poole
delivers him to where Jekyll is sitting by the fire and a change has
come over him. He looks sickly and his voice has changed from the
handsome, entertaining man in earlier chapters.
Utterson asks if Jekyll has heard of Carew’s murder and, when he says
he has, Utterson asks if he’s hiding the man in his house. Jekyll says

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he is not and that no more will ever be heard from Hyde. Utterson
mistrusts his friend as he observes that something has changed in him
but he goes along with it.
Jekyll then confides in him that he has received a letter and only trusts
Utterson with it. It is from Hyde and confirms that he has escaped and
will not be returning. This soothes Utterson’s worries and he agrees to
keep the letter until they have decided what to do with it.
Utterson also says that he believes Hyde was behind the stipulation in
Jekyll’s will and that Jekyll had a lucky escape – that Hyde probably
meant to murder him. On his way out, Utterson checks with Poole, the
servant, if a letter had been delivered that day and when Poole says
no, he is again suspicious and the mystery deepens. At this point we
also learn that Sir Danvers Carew, the murder victim, was in fact a
member of parliament – a very high-profile individual.
Later that evening with Mr Guest, his head clerk and a student of
handwriting, Utterson attempts to figure out the letter that Jekyll has
given him. Guest is familiar with Jekyll’s handwriting as someone who
would write to Utterson often through business and pleasure. Utterson
gives him Hyde’s letter to examine and just then another servant
arrives with an invitation to dinner from no other than Jekyll. Guest
examines both and declares that it is the same handwriting only with
an attempted disguise. Utterson tells Guest not to speak of it and then
he locks the letter away with a bad feeling.

Chapter 6 – Incident of Dr. Lanyon

As time goes on, rewards are offered for the capture of Sir Danvers
Carew’s murderer but he is not to be found. In this time also, Utterson
grows calmer about the situation, believing Hyde to be gone for good
and Jekyll begins to return to his old self – entertaining friends at his
home and visiting others. We are told that physically, he even begins
to look like he did in recent years – healthy and at peace.
This lasted two months before Jekyll again stops seeing his friends
and giving Poole instruction to send visitors away. Utterson, again,

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decides to visit their mutual friend Dr Lanyon. Here he finds Lanyon
very ill – physically, the illness is very visible on him. He is pale,
gaunt, balder and his eyes have taken on a frightened manner.
Lanyon tells Utterson that he has had a shock and he does not think he
will recover. He believes he will die in a matter of weeks. Utterson
remarks that Jekyll is ill too and this brings a change in Lanyon who
says that he will not hear mention of that man anymore and that he is
done with him. Lanyon asks that if he stays, Utterson is to talk of
anything else but Jekyll because he can’t bear it.
After arriving home, Utterson writes a letter to Jekyll complaining
about being kept out of his house and asking about the fall-out with Dr
Lanyon. Jekyll replies that he agrees that he and Lanyon should never
meet again and tells Utterson that he intends to live a life of seclusion,
seeing no one, until he dies. He says that this “darkness”, he has
brought on himself and begs Utterson to respect his wishes.
Within two weeks, Lanyon has died and the night after the funeral he
goes into his office, locks the door and takes out a letter written to
Utterson by Lanyon but only to be opened after his death. Within that
envelope, there is another that is marked “not to be opened till the
death or disappeareance of Dr Henry Jekyll”. Respecting his friend’s
wishes, Utterson returns the letter to his safe. He desires to speak with
Jekyll but when he arrives, he is denied entry and instead, speaks
with Poole at the doorway. He learns from Poole that the doctor
confines himself to his chambers all day and night. It didn’t appear
that he slept and he believes something is troubling his master.

Chapter 7 – Incident at the window

Some time later, on one of their Sunday walks, Utterson and his cousin
Enfield happen to walk past the door that they had stopped in front of
earlier in the novel. Utterson tells Enfield that he once saw the man
Hyde that Enfield had seen trample the young girl and he also tells
him that he shared his feelings of revulsion and disgust upon seeing
him.

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Utterson and Enfield step into the courtyard of Jekyll’s home as
Utterson admits that he is worried for his old friend and wants to have
a look around. At one of the windows, looking miserable and sick,
they see Dr Jekyll.
Utterson calls up that he is looking better but Jekyll replies that he is
not and that he believes he will die soon. Suddenly, mid-conversation,
Jekyll’s face begins to change and a look of utter terror and despair
comes over him before he quickly pulls down the blind.
The two men leave quickly and, when they are some distance away,
they look at each other’s faces which are full of horror and they walk
on in silence.

Chapter 8 – The last night

It is evening and Utterson is sitting by his fire when there is a visit
from Poole who is clearly distressed. Poole tells him that he has been
afraid for about a week and something is happening with Dr Jekyll
and he doesn’t like it. He admits to Utterson that he thinks Jekyll has
been murdered. Utterson gets his coat and his hat immediately and
agrees to follow Poole to Jekyll’s house.
When they arrive at the house, the housemaid is whimpering and
hysterical and Utterson admonishes her and the other staff for all
being in the hallway saying Jekyll would not like it.
Poole takes Utterson around the back and begs him to be as quiet as
possible as he wants him to hear and not be heard. They arrive at
Jekyll’s chamber door and Poole tells him that Mr Utterson is here to
see him. A voice comes from behind the door saying he cannot see
him and Poole and Utterson return to the kitchen. Here, Poole says
that he has been working for Jekyll for twenty years and he knows for
definite that that is not his master’s voice. He believes he has been
murdered because a few days previous they heard a lot of shouting
and crying out.
Utterson cannot understand why, if someone has murdered Jekyll,
they would stay at the scene all this time. Poole tried to explain it by

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saying that whatever is behind the door has been calling out for a
type of medicine that Jekyll used to keep but had been unable to get a
hold of recently. He had become frantic to get it, sending out to
chemists all over London but not finding any that was pure enough.
Now the person who has replaced Jekyll, Poole says, has been doing
the same, giving orders to the staff to try this chemist and that for the
powder.
Poole then tells Utterson that he has seen the man who is behind the
door. He says that he saw him digging through crates in the storage
area and says that, if it was his master, he must have been wearing a
mask.
Utterson believes he has an answer and suggests that maybe Jekyll
has one of those diseases that transform and disfigure the sufferer’s
face and that is why he is looking for medicine – to help him go back
to normal. Poole rejects this completely arguing that what he saw was
not his master and they both come to the conclusion that there is
nothing left to do but break the door down and find out the truth.
They get the help of another servant, Bradshaw, to stand guard with a
pair of sticks while Poole takes an axe and Utterson a poker. Poole
and Utterson stand outside the door listening and decide that what
they hear is not Jekyll’s footsteps. Before they break the door down,
Utterson calls out his final warning and when the voice responds,
Utterson is finally convinced that it is Hyde in the room. They knock
through the door and inside find the figure of Hyde on the carpet
twictiching and wearing clothes that are much too big for him. They
notice a vial in his hand and Utterson knows that Hyde has taken a
substance and killed himself.
They look around the rest of the apartment for the body of Jekyll but
are unable to find it. They are entirely confused. Utterson then finds a
book that Jekyll had much admired and spoken highly of but now
there were terrible things written about it in the margins of the book
in Jekyll’s own handwriting. This unsettles Utterson greatly and
finally, after more searching, they find a letter on a table addressed to
Utterson. He opens it and a few more letters fall out. The first is a will,

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similar to the previous one with one exception. Instead of leaving
everything to Hyde, Jekyll was leaving everything to Utterson. The
next note is dated with that day’s date and addressed to Utterson.
In it, Jekyll says that he has disappeared and that he should go and
read the letter Dr Lanyon gave to him. Utterson takes the third letter
and then goes home to read that and the one that Lanyon gave him.

Chapter 9 – Dr. Lanyon’s narrative

This chapter is Lanyon’s letter to Utterson and, as such, Lanyon is the
narrator. He tells us that four days ago he received a letter from
Jekyll. This is surprising as they had fallen out previously and were
not in touch. He then includes the content of the letter, which begs
him for help and asks him, at once, to come to his house where Poole
will be waiting with a locksmith to break in to his chambers. Lanyon is
to go in alone to a specific drawer and take a vial, some powders and
a book. He is to then take these items back to his house and wait until
midnight when a man, who will present himself as Jekyll, will call for
them. He is to hand them over and, through this, will save Jekyll’s life.
Lanyon, after reading, decides that Jekyll must be insane but still feels
duty-bound to comply. He goes to the house and does everything
asked of him. Afterwards, looking at the pocket book, he sees a series
of dates going over a number of years but that the dates ended “quite
abruptly” around a year ago and there is a single word written at that
point: “double”.
Again, Lanyon, decides to follow Jekyll’s wishes but loads an old
revolver in case the caller isn’t as trustworthy as his old friend. At
midnight, a man calls and Lanyon is immediately hit by how much he
dislikes him. He comments that he looked disfigured and made his
skin crawl but couldn’t put his finger on exactly why. The man is
desperate for the contents of the drawer and is quite abrupt with
Lanyon. He asks for a glass and mixes some of the powders there in
the room with Lanyon.

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He then says to Lanyon that, if he wants, he can get an explanation and
see what is about to happen or, if he wants, the man can leave with the
contents and Lanyon will be none the wiser. Lanyon says he wants to
see and the man reminds him that what he is about to see is to remain
entirely private. The man drinks the potion and turns into Dr Henry
Jekyll. Lanyon is horrified. He says that his life has been shaken to its
roots and he is unsure if he believes what he saw or not.
Lanyon signs off the letter by saying that, according to Jekyll, the man
who called at midnight to his house was Mr Hyde, the murderer of Sir
Carew.

Chapter 10 – Henry Jekyll’s full statement of the case

This chapter consists of Henry Jekyll’s letter to Utterson explaining the
events of the novel. Again, our narrator changes, this time to Jekyll.
He begins by telling us about his background – heir to a large
fortune, with a desire to work and to be thought well of by his friends
and acquaintances. It is because of this, he says, that he began to hide
his pleasures and regard them with a morbid sense of shame. He
discusses then the “dual nature” of men where we have to balance the
good and bad sides of our characters and how people restrain
themselves from certain things in the name of decency or being a
good person. He admits that his scientific work was leading him in the
direction of the mystical and he comes to discover that man is not just
one person, but two. He suggests that it may turn out, after further
discoveries, that man is more than two, even a collection of different
personalities and states. Jekyll’s work focuses on the idea of the moral
split in man, the division between good and bad. He admits that he
was in touch with both sides of his character even before his interest
in the scientific side of it developed.
His experiments, he says, showed him that certain chemicals could
draw back the barrier between these two sides of man but that, as his
letter will show, his discoveries were incomplete. He waited quite a
while before putting his potion to the test as he was quite worried that

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it might kill him but eventually he does and he is full of pain, sickness
and a “horror of the spirit” before they all went away and he was left
as Mr Hyde. He felt younger, happier and freer – knowing that he
could do whatever he pleased. He says he knew immediately that he
was wicked but he was happy to embrace it. At this stage he realized
that he had become smaller. When he looked in the mirror, he could
see that evil was imprinted on Hyde’s face and body. Jekyll realized
that anyone who saw Hyde would react badly to him because, all
people are a mix of good and evil but Hyde was all evil and people
recognized it in him. Worried about what might happen if he was
seen, he takes another potion and returns to the body of Jekyll.
That night, Jekyll says, he thought about the drug and knew that the
drug itself was not good or evil, it simply brought about a change in
the person who took it. The evil side of Jekyll, he says, began to take
over. The powder tempted him and he fell into addiction. All he had
to do was drink it and he could shake off the old, learned, kind
professor and become the young, hell-raising Hyde.
He tells all the staff that they are to obey Mr Hyde and then he draws
up the will leaving everything to Hyde in case of his death or
disappearance. He indulges in many pleasures as Hyde – things he
could never have done as Dr Jekyll – but pretty soon, Hyde’s acts and
deeds become more monstrous.
Some months later, Jekyll begins to lose control of the transformations
and they begin to happen without his control. He wakes up one
morning and he has yet to turn back to Jekyll. This terrifies him as his
evil side is beginning to become more dominant.
He realizes he must choose between the two sides of himself. After
much debate, he chooses Jekyll but, he admits, he still keeps Hyde’s
house in Soho and his clothes. After a few months, the desire to once
again be Hyde proves too much and he takes another potion. This
time however, having not used it for months, the potion unleashes a
new anger in Hyde and it scares him. He decides that he will destroy
all of Hydes things in Soho and revert to Jekyll for good. On his way,
however, he runs into Carew and murders him. It is this act that puts

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Jekyll on the straight and narrow for another few months. He says to
Utterson that he knows how much he tried to enjoy people’s company
and entertain people in the last few months. Unfortunately, although
he doesn’t take a potion, he finds himself one day transforming into
Hyde. He arranges with Lanyon to get the powders from his chambers
and then goes to Lanyon’s house to get them.
After this, Jekyll realizes that he has to take the potion simply to
remain as Jekyll, that Hyde has taken over completely and he
transforms without warning at any hour of the day. Jekyll and Hyde
are locked in a battle for power of the body they share and both
detest and hate the other. It is in this despair that Jekyll spends his
final weeks.
He keeps drinking potions but they have no effect and can’t change
him back. He is convinced that the first batch had some impurity in it
that was the secret ingredient. Jekyll, at the end of the letter, just
before returning to the body of Hyde, says that this is the hour of his
death and he does not care what happens to Hyde afterwards.

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 Part 3: The author

Robert Louis Stevenson was a big star of the 19th century literary
scene. Considered the “next big thing” by many other writers who
were working at the same time as him, he was already very well
known for the novel Treasure Island which was published in 1883 -
three years before Jekyll and Hyde. Treasure Island, despite being a
very good book entirely on its own merit, is considered first and
foremost a children’s book and it’s to Stevenson’s childhood we turn
first to learn a bit more about The Strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr
Hyde.
Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in
December 1850. His father was a well-respected engineer
specialising in the construction, design and maintenance of
lighthouses (of which there were many on the Scottish coast -
considered at this time to be one of the most dangerous areas for
ships in the world). His mother was the daughter of a clergyman (a
minister or a priest). Childhood was a time of difficulty for young
Louis as he was a very sickly child. He was often so poorly that he
missed long periods of school and his education was attended to by
private tutors at home - sometimes he would receive his lessons while
he was in bed.
Despite his long absences from school, Stevenson’s father, Thomas,
was confident that his son would become an engineer and follow in
the family business. In fact, he was so confident of this that he didn’t
really see the point of his son going to school at all - he is reported to
have told Louis that all school is good for is learning to sit on your
bum! He believed that his son would learn all he had to about the
family business by being an apprentice and going to work with his
father when he was old enough.
As well as not believing very much in formal schooling for his son,
Stevenson’s father (and mother) used their wealth to secure every

19
treatment and drug available at the time to treat their son’s many
illnesses and ailments (it’s thought that he may have had tuberculosis
which is a disease of the lungs that was very common in the Victorian
period). Other than securing medication, Stevenson’s parents - like
many Victorian parents of the upper classes - left most of the actual
day-to-day raising of their child to the live-in nanny. Her name was
Alison Cunningham (known as ‘Cummy’) and it is to this woman that
we can trace some of the ideas that appear decades later in Jekyll and
Hyde.
Cummy was a deeply religious woman and a Calvinist: a very strict
branch of Christianity. She influenced the young Stevenson greatly as
she told him stories about the Covenanters (another, even stricter,
branch of Christians in Scotland at the time) and the devil and what
happened to people who lived an unchristian life. For Cummy, who
thought that cards were of the devil and that people who broke the
sabbath by playing games on a Sunday needed to be prayed for, this
meant pretty much everyone. The particular stories that Stevenson
would have heard are much to do with blood, sacrifice and hoping to
be accepted into heaven after death. Stevenson himself spoke about
the nightmares he used to have that left him “clinging to the horizontal
bar of the bed with my knees and chin together, my soul shaken, my
body convulsed with agony.” Often the young Stevenson would dream
of hell and admits himself that he was afraid to go to sleep some
nights in case he died and wasn’t accepted into heaven.
One of the stories that would have been very common at the time
and was sure to have been known by Stevenson was that of a Scottish
Covenanter, Major Thomas Weir. He was well-respected and looked
up to by many as a most religious and devout man. He and his wife
held services outdoors attracting many followers and his reputation
grew and grew over the years. He was believed to be close to God
because he dedicated his whole life to serving God. A great scandal
arose, however, when towards the end of his life, he admitted that the
whole thing was a sham, that he and his wife had been engaging in
deeply unreligious activity (mostly sexual) and that he had lived a
terrible life in private. When charged, he and his wife admitted to

20
meeting the devil and making a pact with him. He was burnt at the
stake and she was also sentenced to death. It’s not hard to see some
links between Major Weir’s life and that of Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll.
Victorian society was one where there was a great emphasis placed
on how one behaved and the “proper” ways for men and women to
act. It was important for men to be gentlemen and for women to be
submissive, obedient and supportive. In this society, any mention of
sex or sexuality was strictly forbidden. This is despite the fact that,
quite obviously, sex was something that was happening. This divide,
the idea that something which was occurring between men and
women but could not be spoken about in a rational and normal way
was something that Stevenson was very aware of and something which
inhabits many of his stories but especially Jekyll and Hyde.
As Stevenson developed as a writer, he continually returned to this
idea that a person is not simply one person, but has more than one
personality or mindset that constantly battles with the other. We might
see similarities today with the idea that there’s an angel on one
shoulder encouraging you to do the right thing while on the other
there is a devil trying to lead you astray. Stevenson wrote letters to
friends about his childhood spent ill in bed and, at times, suffering
from dangerous fevers. It was at this time, he says, that he really
became aware of another “person”, another consciousness within him.
He called the two “myself and the other fellow”. The other fellow, he
said, was careless, reckless and irrational. Again, the similarities
between this and the novel he wrote are striking.
With the influence of his nanny, Cummy, and her visions of heaven
and hell and his sharp recognition of the divide between the private
person and the public person, we can begin to see Jekyll and Hyde as
a very personal story for Stevenson which goes far beyond what most
people thought of it when it was first published - that it was just a
“shilling shocker”. Stevenson was, in effect, living two lives. On one
hand he was an up and coming engineer in a very successful family
firm. This was his public face. In reality, however, he didn’t derive any
joy from engineering or the thought of working in the family business.
He wanted to be a writer, something his father actively discouraged.

21
 When he finally admitted that he didn’t want to be an engineer, he
was allowed to study law (which he never practised as he began to
publish stories while he was studying). It was in this time that he
began to associate with people his family would have considered of a
very low order in Edinburgh’s Old town (which you can read more
about in the chapter on setting). Here it’s believed that Stevenson even
became friends with many prostitutes - another link to the repressive
and secretive Victorian views on sexuality. These women were looked
down upon as the lowest of the low despite often having many upper
class “customers” who were also living this double life.
As we can see, Stevenson’s upbringing and early life in the upper
classes of Victorian British society forced him to both recognise and
also to live this double life of being good and proper in your public
life but battling inner desires and compulsions in your private life -
something many people would argue still exists today. Most people
would admit that they have thoughts or secrets that they would never
share with anyone else and that it’s important to behave in a certain
way in public. Jekyll and Hyde takes much of Stevenson’s personal life
and adjusts it to ask the question - what if the dark side won out?

22
Part 4: The novel

As the “next big thing” of the Victorian literary scene, Robert Louis
Stevenson seemed to have it all in front of him. He had fame and
relative financial security following the success of Treasure Island and
all he had to do was to write the great literary landmark that everyone
expected of him rather than further exploit his considerable talents
for money. Unfortunately for his friends and other contemporary
writers, the next book was Jekyll and Hyde. The book was dismissed as
a “shilling shocker”, a cheap, quickly produced story of low quality
that is consumed by the masses just for entertainment.
Although Stevenson didn’t initially think much of his story (he was
much more excited about the release of his book Prince Otto: A
Romance which was published shortly after he finished the first draft
of Jekyll and Hyde), he wasn’t prepared to pass up the opportunity to
make money. Ironically, the novel that made Stevenson’s friends think
that he had given up real literature has ended up being one of his
enduring successes.
The novel itself was published in 1886 and, according to Stevenson,
came to him in a dream whilst he was very ill and possibly close to
death. He was confined to bed and had been given medication (one of
the side effects was hallucinations) to ease his pain. During the night,
his wife, Fanny, awoke to find him in the middle of a night terror. As
she woke him, he is said to have scolded her as he was dreaming the
story of Jekyll and Hyde. According to Stevenson, he dreamt two
scenes from the story - the one of Dr Jekyll taking the powders that
initiates the change into Hyde and the scene close to the beginning
where Hyde tramples the young girl.
We have seen in the previous section the idea that Stevenson
constantly thought about man’s duality, that there is more than one
side to each person. Here was a novel that discussed this idea in great
detail. Stevenson himself said of the book that he had “long been
trying to write a story on [the] subject, to find a body, a vehicle, for
that strong sense of man’s double being…” He certainly found that
“vehicle” in Jekyll and Hyde.

23
 Some of the key ideas in the novel, the nature of dreams revealing
truths, of the subconscious and of the idea of drugs or powders
releasing something within men, are all played out in Stevenson’s own
life. He believed quite strongly in the subconscious as revealing to
him parts of his true self. He even said once that he couldn’t take all
the credit for his story as most of it came from his subconscious mind.
This idea of people having a dual nature or combining two
personalities is played out over and over again in the novel but also in
Stevenson’s own life. This novel, which made him a superstar in Britain
and America and lots of money, also cost him his reputation at the time
as a “serious” writer. As we have seen in the previous chapter,
Stevenson lived a sort of double life and his experiences of religion
(through Cummy and his parents) and of Victorian society made him
somewhat critical of the hypocrisy and hidden side to people of the
time.
We also mentioned earlier the Victorian’s repressive attitude to sex
and sexuality. It’s interesting to note that many of the film or television
versions of Jekyll and Hyde (which come many years later in the early
20th century) tend to depict Hyde as a sex-crazed monster, that women
are unsafe around him, that his primary evil is lust and desire. This is
interesting on a number of levels. Firstly, this isn’t at all apparent in the
novel on a surface level. It is however, suggested that after writing the
first draft, his wife, Fanny, told him that it would never be published
(due to decency laws) and that he had missed the opportunity to write
an allegory, an extended metaphor about human behaviour. The
subsequent redrafting, which removed many more obvious references
to the previous sexual experiences of the characters involved, led to a
much more subtle story where many things are hinted at but not
exactly said.
In this case, is Stevenson saying that our dark sides, our “Mr
Hydes”, are primarily concerned with our sexuality and that
repressing or covering them up so much is actually doing us harm?
There is the suggestion that the novel is dealing with the idea of
fighting our real desires or appetites in order to fit into Victorian
society. The picture is of a London (or Edinburgh) in the 1800s full of

24
men who, to the outside world look respectable and trustworthy, but
underneath are fighting against their own terrible desires. This would
have been incredibly shocking at the time it was published but it does
link somewhat to other things that were emerging in the world of
psychoanalysis at the time (see the chapter on context).
The novel also suggests that the taking of drugs or, as Jekyll does in
the novel, the taking of “powders” releases some sort of internal
demon that isn’t constrained by the rules that society has created. In
Jekyll and Hyde, Hyde is physically deformed or somehow terrible to
look at. This would link quite well to the Victorian notion that
deformity or disfigurement somehow meant that a person was evil,
that their inner deformity was visible on the outside. Victorians were
terrified by the idea that they wouldn’t know a person’s true intent or
character. The police at the time even compiled thousands and
thousands of photographs of criminals and lower class people in the
hope that studying them would reveal what a criminal or evil person
looked like. The message to emerge from Jekyll and Hyde, that anyone
can have a secret self, buried deep within until released, would have
been very unsettling.
This novel then captures very well the idea of man being more than
just one person or personality. It’s a tale that still resonates today as we
constantly battle with competing forces within us. The novel that both
made Stevenson a star and a fortune and destroyed his reputation
among friends and writers of the time as a “proper writer” is much
more personal than many people at the time and since think. The
double life that Stevenson himself led in Edinburgh, the influence of
stories and characters from his childhood showing the two sides to
people and the often subtle but nonetheless significant allusions to
sex and sexuality, all point to a story that is much more “of” Robert
Louis Stevenson than he, his wife or even his friends would care to
admit.

25
 Part 5: The setting

The Strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is set in the London of the
late Victorian period - around the 1880s. It is, however, quite different
to many other novels and stories set in London at this time (most
notably the Sherlock Holmes tales). In many other stories, the city of
London comes alive in the details descriptions and almost plays the
role of a character in the story itself. In Jekyll and Hyde however, while
there are descriptions that are most definitely London, there are,
under the surface, striking resemblances to another British city. There
is a long-held theory that the London of the novel is actually closer to
Stevenson’s home city of Edinburgh, with which he would have been
much more familiar.
Both cities would have been smog-filled, dark and dangerous
places in the late nineteenth century but there are certain aspects that
are impossible to ignore that relate to events in the novel. At this time
in Britain, many people moved from the countryside to the cities.
London, in the 19th Century, was a city that had grown enormously in
the space of 100 years. In the century from 1800 to 1900, London’s
population exploded. With roughly one million people living in the
city at the beginning of the 19th Century, London’s position as the
capital of the British Empire made it attractive to immigrants from all
of the empire’s colonies. Within 100 years, the population had grown
to nearly 7 million people - a hugely significant increase.
It’s important to remember that this London of contrasts was
home to people of significant and almost unimaginable wealth as well
as to people dying of flu in overcrowded rooms, home to families of
up to 20 people. Similarly, Edinburgh of Stevenson’s youth was as
divided and different as the two characters that make up the name of
his novel. In today’s Edinburgh there is the Old town and the New
town. This ‘New’ town was built in the late 18th century as the upper
classes and better off people of the city had grown tired of living so
close to people of lower classes. The new part of the city was
constructed within walking distance of the Old town but whereas the
New town, where Stevenson grew up, had bright street lighting, wide

26
streets and immaculately kept homes, the Old town was left to decay
further. Here there were dangerous characters of all descriptions -
thieves, drunks, prostitutes and murderers - all within walking
distance of the respectable citizens of Edinburgh. It is this interesting
facet of Edinburgh that leads many people to believe that while the
action takes place in London, the story is really, at heart, from the
winding alleyways and divided society of Edinburgh.
As we have seen in the chapter about the author, Stevenson
became very familiar with the Old town of Edinburgh and would have
mostly kept these activities secret. Just like many other upper class
gentlemen who would have made the short walk from the New town to
the Old to sample its darker atmosphere, Stevenson, in public, was a
fine young man from a fine family who was set to be a great lawyer or
engineer. Again, the dual nature, the double life is something that
strikes a chord with Dr Jekyll in the novel.
Another fine gentleman from this period who Stevenson was
very interested in and even wrote about but the story was never
published, was a man called Deacon Brodie. Deacon William Brodie
was an upstanding gentleman, a master craftsman who made cabinets
and a city councilor. He had the title of Deacon as he was head of one
of the city’s trade guilds - a sort of association of craftsmen, which
would have been a very important title to have in 18th century Britain.
Because of his status, Brodie associated with all of the finest people in
Edinburgh. He also repaired cabinets and the locks and mechanisms
on them. He had access to the finest homes and wealthiest families in
the city. All of this meant that he was the last person anyone
suspected when there was a sudden increase in burglaries in all the
finest homes in the city.
As it turned out, because of gambling debts he had incurred
from spending his evenings in the Old town associating with
criminals, Brodie needed money and considering he had such a good
knowledge of the homes and the locks and cabinets of the richest
people in the city - he took it from them. Again, the resemblance with
Jekyll and Hyde is plain to see: a respectable gentleman by day, a

27
dangerous criminal by night. The fact that Stevenson wrote a piece of
work based on him is evidence enough to suggest that he had a big
impact on the young man but also the fact that, in his bedroom as a
child, there was one of Brodie’s cabinets is also very interesting.
Much has been said and written about why Stevenson decided
to set his story in London. Some say that he simply wanted the story to
make more money. People in London would have been more
interested in the story if it was set in the city they were from. This,
however, is slightly less believable than another theory that further
deepens the idea of the dual nature of man.
In London in the 18th century, there was a surgeon by the name
of John Hunter. He was also known as “The Knife Man”. He was a
pioneering surgeon and made many discoveries. In order to develop
his knowledge of human anatomy however, he had to do dissections.
At this time, it was legal only for aspiring surgeons to carry out
dissections on the dead bodies of criminals who had been executed.
As with sexuality, Victorian society was squeamish about the idea of
men cutting up decent gentlemen and women, even if they were
already dead and even if it was for the pursuit of knowledge. This was
a time of really quite rapid development in science and medicine (see
the chapter on context for more on this) and if surgeons wanted to
keep up, they had to have a good supply of bodies.
In Edinburgh at the time, two famous men - William Burke and
William Hare - made a lot of money from digging up bodies that had
recently been buried and selling them to a well-known surgeon in the
city. This was, of course, entirely illegal but they made so much
money that they decided that they would get them even fresher and
began to murder people and bring the bodies around to the
surgeon’s home. Stevenson would have, again, been familiar with this
story and even wrote a story about it himself called The
Bodysnatchers.
The famous John Hunter in London may have been acquiring
bodies in the same way but even the ones that were legal, the bodies
of executed criminals, would have caused a stir if they were delivered

28
to his front door - a respectable home in what is today Leicester
Square. To combat this, he bought the house behind his own home
and knocked down walls and built connecting corridors which meant
that to the front, he had a beautiful, well-decorated home where he
would entertain guests and enter and exit. To the rear he had built
dissecting rooms and lecture theatres and, exiting out on to a very
unfashionable and grotty Castle Street, he had the back door where
the bodies were to be left in the morning.
Whether or not Stevenson had London or Edinburgh in mind for
Jekyll and Hyde, it’s clear that he has borrowed from both. Edinburgh
itself is divided, a city with two personalities or faces - the
respectable, upper class one and the lower, dangerous and illicit one.
He also borrowed from John “The knife Man” Hunter the idea for
Jekyll’s home - a respectable front to something much darker and
sinister. In fact, the description of Dr Jekyll’s home in the story is so
close to that of Hunter’s that it must be more than coincidence.

29
 Part 6: The context

Class
The 1800s in Britain was a time of great change. One of the most
challenging things for the established upper classes in Victorian
society was the influx of people viewed as working class or lower
classes into the big cities of Britain. They were coming in search of
work and housing but the cities of the time, especially London, were
quite unprepared for them. The sudden increase in numbers made the
upper classes nervous. They were clearly outnumbered and they
began to create areas of these cities where they would not go and
other areas where they would socialise. This division of the cities into
“no-go areas” was interesting because it created an “other” in London
specifically. Rich people tended to live in the west and stories of the
debauchery and the goings on in places like the East End and Soho
were both shocking and fascinating to them.
Many stories and novels from this time fall into the category of
“shilling shockers”. Stories that were written about these other people
in order to shock, appall and entertain the upper classes. The lower
classes about whom they were written were largely illiterate so they
were not the intended audience. Stevenson’s Jekyll and Hyde however,
was written about the sort of upper class gentlemen whose wives
would have read these “shilling shockers” and, as such, caused quite a
stir. It was seen as typical of the lower classes to engage in this sort of
behaviour (it was thought, for example, that there were thousands of
prostitutes in the East End of London at the time the novel was
published) but for a well-respected gentleman to have such a dark
side to him was frightening.
The allegorical nature of the story was not lost on its audience at
the time it was published either. Many saw the story as a morality tale
of what can happen when you indulge or give in to your darker side.
This is emphatically shown in the novel, as it is indeed the dark side
that wins out and claims Jekyll. The nature of class is interesting in
Jekyll and Hyde because there is no one really of the lower classes
present in the story, except for, possibly Hyde himself.

30
 Medical discoveries
Science and medicine were also changing quickly at this time in
history. As we have seen in earlier chapters, famous surgeons were
experimenting and dissecting bodies to learn all they could about
human anatomy. The first transplants were carried out around this time
too by men such as John Hunter. Hunter conducted bizarre
experiments where he grafted a human tooth onto a chicken’s head to
see if it would grow, as well as many other experiments. This notion of
the “mad scientist” shocked the public and many of the experiments
were carried out in secret and their results shared among respected
members of the profession in private houses around Britain.
These themes are also carried through to Jekyll and Hyde where we
see Dr Jekyll in his London home with his labs and powders locked
away with his research. He begins to experiment on himself (which
John Hunter is also reputed to have done) and soon, he gets into a
situation he can’t handle. This was a common fear of the Victorian age
- of discovering something shocking or creating something monstrous
(think Frankenstein) that would overpower us and destroy us.
Clearly Stevenson is addressing these concerns only this time,
instead of it being a creation, or something terrible from the East End
of London like in most of the “shilling shockers” of the day, in this case
the monster comes from within. It already exists. All that is required is
some medical marvel to unleash it and destroy it’s other, better, half.

The development of psychoanalysis

Stevenson, according to his wife, read many reports, mostly from
France, of the growing field of psychoanalysis and dream analysis. He
was obsessed with dreams, their meanings and their relation to our
subconscious selves (or the “other fellow” as Stevenson christened his
other self). Stevenson’s wife even went so far as to claim that the seed
for Jekyll and Hyde actually came from a French scientific journal.

31
Stevenson said that he had read a scientific article about a young
Frenchman who had developed a case where he would have dramatic
and severe personality shifts as a result of a severe shock but he
maintained that he had read that account after the publication of Jekyll
and Hyde.
It’s difficult to resist seeing many parallels with the work of
Sigmund Freud, the most famous psychoanalysts and the man who is
seen as the father of psychoanalysis. Freud was a few years younger
than Stevenson but it is very likely that they would have been reading
the same journals and articles and so, would have been exposed to
the same ideas. Some of Stevenson’s ideas predate Freud’s, especially
those of the duality of man, but their similarities are very clear.
Freud’s theories cover the ideas of the subconscious and how the
conscious self (the public self) covers up the desires and wishes of the
subconscious (the private self) until, as we grow older, we completely
forget the subconscious. He is able, according to his
research, to access a patient’s subconscious through dialogue and, in
many cases, able to identify and locate the cause of some illness of the
present in the patient’s past - usually a suppressed and covered up
event in childhood.
As an Austrian, Freud would not have necessarily shared the
Victorians’ general aversion to anything related to sex and, as such,
many of his theories relate to the repression of sexuality and sexual
inclination. Again, this is something that appears to be central to our
understanding of Jekyll and Hyde.
Similarly, another book published at the time and one that was
entirely shocking yet widely talked about was Psychopathia Sexualis
written by another European, Richard Von Krafft-Ebing. His book was a
study of sexual behaviour in people and included many case studies
and interviews. To the Victorian society for which any talk of sexuality
was completely forbidden or spoken about in metaphors and knowing
glances, this was a treasure-trove of information to be appalled by.
That it was published around the same time as Jekyll and Hyde and
that Jekyll and Hyde was subtle enough to leave most of the details up
to the imaginations of its readers means that Jekyll and Hyde took on a

32
very new meaning (possibly many different and conflicting meanings)
in readers’ minds.

Jekyll and Hyde then is a book of its time. It was a time when
medicine was about to unveil the inner mysteries of human anatomy,
when psychoanalysis was about to unveil the inner mysteries of the
human mind and human sexuality and also a time when class and
political tensions were threatening the established status quo, the cosy
consensus that had existed for the upper classes for decades. To say
that the Victorians were neither ready nor equipped for all these
changes is an understatement. In this context, Jekyll and Hyde emerges
to shock, fascinate and hold a mirror up to the people who were
reading it.

33
 Part 7: Character analysis – Dr. Henry Jekyll

Dr Henry Jekyll is a well-respected scientist who is famous for his

intellect, his gentlemanly qualities and his dinner parties. At these
parties, we learn, there are usually men “all intelligent and reputable”
and also, all “judges of good wine”. Jekyll, then, is a member of the
upper classes who is liked by his peers and used to the finer things in
life.
Jekyll is a man of fifty who is “large, well-made, smooth-
faced…[with] every mark of capacity and kindness”. Stevenson, in his
first presentation of Jekyll is sure to present him as a character for
whom we have positive feelings. He is shown to be the kind, generous
Victorian gentleman. He has recently made out a will that is being
kept by the lawyer, Mr Utterson. Utterson, however, is disturbed by the
will because Jekyll has decided that, should he die, he wants to leave
his considerable fortune to a man by the name of Mr Hyde.
In his “statement of the case” (chapter 10) we learn that Henry
Jekyll was born “to a large fortune” and had a thoroughly good
upbringing. He was “inclined by nature to industry, fond of the respect
of the wise and good among my fellow-men, and thus, as might have
been supposed, with every guarantee of an honourable and
distinguished future”. In short, Jekyll is the perfect Victorian
gentleman. He’s from a good family and, to anyone looking at him from
outside, he would have been almost guaranteed a good future.
Here, however, Stevenson introduces this idea of the double life. He
tells us that “the worst of [his] faults was a certain impatient gaiety of
disposition” which attempted to trivialise his indiscretions in his
younger years. He goes on to give a closer idea of what he got up to as
a young man when he says that he hid these “irregularities” with an
almost “morbid sense of shame”. The suggestion here is that his
activities as a younger man were sexual in nature and, although not
specified directly (remember, Stevenson’s wife objected to the first
draft being too explicit) it’s interesting to remember that
homosexuality was still a crime in Victorian society.

34
 Jekyll hides and represses these youthful indiscretions and says
that he “concealed his pleasures” for the sake of his career and
standing in society. It is these indiscretions that Utterson thinks Hyde
is using to blackmail Jekyll into leaving him all his possessions. In
covering up his youthful activities, Jekyll says that he came to realise
the “profound duplicity of life”. He begins to develop a theory or idea
of how one might separate these two personalities - the good side and
the bad side. In his experiments, he develops a potion that, when
drunk, transforms Henry Jekyll into Edward Hyde.
An interesting point to make here is that this novel is not simply a
story about good versus evil as it’s often made out to be. While
Edward Hyde is a distillation of pure evil, Henry Jekyll isn’t all good.
He admits that within himself he often fights his desires and
compulsions in order to conform to Victorian society. He is a mixed
character and when he takes the potion, he must have had some
element of evil in him to create Hyde. He says himself that “had [he]
approached [his] discovery in a more noble spirit, had [he] risked the
experiment while under the empire of generous or pious aspirations,
all must have been otherwise, and from [the experiment] … come
forth an angel instead of a fiend”.
What Jekyll is saying here is that he was looking for an excuse or a
way to carry out these “concealed pleasures” of his when he took the
potion and, from that beginning, was spawned Hyde. If he had been
good in his intentions, the creature that he transformed into would
have been good. So, rather than the potion separating good from evil,
it can be viewed as distilling and separating true desires. Again, when
read in Victorian times, this idea would have been very unsettling,
especially given the added sexual undertones.
Ultimately, Jekyll is too weak to contain Hyde. At first, he intends to
use Hyde to fulfil his pleasures. He tells the servants of his own house
that the man, Edward Hyde, is to be allowed full access to the house
and not to be spoken to. He also sets up an apartment for Hyde in
Soho, one of the seedier areas of London at the time, and continues to
take the potion to transform into Hyde and then, in the morning,
change back into the respectable Dr Henry Jekyll.

35
 Over time, Hyde begins to appear when he wants to. Jekyll loses
control. This is one of the most troubling allegories of the story. Is
Stevenson saying here that if we give in to our darker sides that they
will ultimately end up winning out over our good? Or, is he saying that
to repress and conceal these sides to ourselves is to hide who we are
and damage ourselves psychologically? It’s clear that Jekyll is in many
ways horrified by his own actions when he’s transformed into Hyde
but he continues to go back to his rooms and take the potion. At one
point in the novel, Dr Jekyll assures Mr Utterson that there is nothing to
worry about and, if he wished, Hyde would disappear never to return.
We come to realise that this isn’t true and, in fact, echoes the words of
many addicts before and since.

36
 Part 8: Character analysis – Mr. Edward Hyde

Mr Edward Hyde is described to us many times in the novel and

yet, despite that, there’s a certain fluid nature to him; he can’t
necessarily be captured. The only constant between each of the
characters who encounter him is that they feel a physical revulsion, an
overwhelming sense of badness and evil. Unlike Jekyll, Hyde is unable
to hide who he is and what he represents.
Hyde is first described by Enfield, Utterson’s walking companion.
In contrast to Jekyll, who is described in glowing and positive terms,
Hyde is first described trampling a young girl on the pavement and
leaving her screaming in agony. Physically he is described not like a
man, but “like some damned Juggernaut”. Enfield tells us that when
they caught him, he was “perfectly cool” but gave him “one look, so
ugly that it brought out a sweat” on him. He furthers his description by
telling us that he “had taken a loathing to him at first sight” and that
another man there, a doctor, “turned sick and white with the desire to
kill him” every time he caught sight of him.
Enfield tells Utterson of the house where Hyde entered and came
out of (the back door to the home of Henry Jekyll) and refers to it as
“Blackmail House” as he believes Henry Jekyll to be “an honest man
paying through the nose for some of the capers of his youth”.
The descriptions of Hyde are very interesting and the language
that Stevenson uses is also quite telling. When Utterson finally catches
up with Hyde and approaches him, Hyde shrinks back from him “with
a hissing intake of breath”. Hyde is often described in animalistic
terms. He is presented as not fully formed (he walks with a limp,
appears young and is short) which could represent that the evil or
dark side of Jekyll was when he was a younger man or it could also
mean that he’s not yet fully formed in his evil ways. Just like a newborn
animal takes time to adjust to the world, the newborn Hyde is getting
used to his surroundings.
We see that, when talking with a gentleman, Hyde does not use
“fitting language” and at one point in his conversation with Utterson,
he “snarled aloud into a savage laugh”. Stevenson is presenting a

37
character who is almost animal-like in his reactions and interactions
and when he is described visually, he is “pale and dwarfish” with a
“broken voice” and altogether “hardly human”. All who meet Hyde
find that his “unpleasantness” is infections and he inspires in people
“a nausea and distaste for life”.
Stevenson could be trying to suggest through the character of Hyde
that our subconscious (see context) is more primal and closer to
nature than our conscious selves are. This recalls Freud’s work on the
subconscious and the primal, subconscious motives that drive us.
Stevenson may be hinting that, for all our civilisation and all the strict
rules of Victorian society, underneath the polish, all of us harbour
some of these more animalistic, base actions.
When Hyde murders Sir Danvers Carew his actions are shown to
have much more of an impact than just on the murdered man. Hyde’s
actions are suggested to be depraved and perverted but only the
trampling of the young girl at the beginning and the murder of Sir
Danvers Carew are described to the reader in any detail. The other
indiscretions are left up to the reader’s imagination. In the case of the
murder, it is suggested that Hyde, for no reason, responds to Carew’s
‘good evening’ by attacking him with his cane.
The words of the eye-witness are important because it allows us to
see some of the themes and ideas of class (see context) reflected in
the world of the novel. According to the witness, Carew bows and
approaches Hyde with “a pretty manner of politeness”. The witness
describes Carew’s face as “innocent” and having an “old-world
kindness of disposition”. Once she looks at Hyde however, she
“conceived a dislike” and goes on to describe how Hyde “carried on
like a madman”, attacking Carew with “an ape-like fury” and showing
“insensate cruelty”.
Here Carew represents the upper-class of Victorian London. The
“old-world kindness” refers to the established values among the
Victorian class who were nervous and worried about the influx of
others not like them into London, for fear their way of life would be
altered or overtaken. Hyde represents the other, with an animalistic
and violent fury, he smashes this old way of life to pieces and it is a

38
crime, we are told, that “startled London” and that it was even more
notable “by the high position of the victim”. Hyde’s actions here have
shaken an entire city and destroyed its peace.
Hyde represents the dangerous elements of London in the Victorian
period. He lives and “socialises” in Soho, one of the places to which
respectable Victorians would not have ventured (publicly at least) and
his actions are not tempered or constrained either by the rule of law
or by what society expects of him. In many ways, Hyde is the only
character in the story who is actually true to himself. He is mostly evil
and he acts on this evil without thinking. All of the other characters
mediate their thoughts and feelings through what is right or what is
thought to be right.

39
 Part 9: Character analysis – Mr. Utterson

Stevenson presents Mr Utterson very carefully in the opening

pages of the novel for a number of reasons. Firstly, much of the action
is seen through Utterson’s eyes and, because its subject matter is quite
unbelievable, it’s crucial that Stevenson make him as believable as
possible. To do this he presents him first and foremost as a lawyer, a
man who is professional and used to strange and peculiar cases. He
also makes him a very serious character. We are told that he “was
never lighted by a smile; cold scanty and embarrassed in discourse;
backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and yet somehow
lovable”.
This description is Stevenson through and through. He sets up his
character as someone very serious, dry, not prone to smiling but then
at the end turns it on its head by using the adjective “lovable”. This
encourages a positive response to Utterson from the reader and,
having established that he’s serious and not prone to any extremes of
personality (probably the complete opposite of Dr Jekyll) he then
goes on to embellish or decorate his character with some positive
traits.
We learn that “when the wine was to his taste, something eminently
human beaconed from his eye”. But, in case we think that he drinks
too much, we are reminded that he is “austere with himself” and,
although he likes the theatre, he hasn’t “crossed the doors of one for
twenty years”. Despite the fact that he is strict with himself and
doesn’t go in for frivolities like the theatre, we also learn something
very important - he’s tolerant of other people. He has always been
“inclined to help rather than reprove” and goes along with a saying of
his own: “I let my brother go to the devil in his own way”.
This makes Mr Utterson quite a unique character. He represents
much of the ideals of the Victorian gentleman - he is serious yet
human, tolerant of others but strict with himself - but he is contrast to a
character such as Henry Jekyll, as he is not thought to have the dual
nature within him. Also, his tolerance is quite interesting. As a
Victorian, there were lots of things considered to be wrong or outside

40
of the rules of society. Sex and sexuality were repressed and not
spoken of; homosexuality was illegal and despised. Men and women
filled very clear and defined roles and children too were expected to
behave according to their class. To be tolerant was something that
would not have been shared universally across Victorian society.
It is important, however, that Utterson is all of these things because,
as we said at the beginning, he needs to be a serious man so that we
can believe his version of events, regardless of how shocking or
strange they are. Similarly, he needs to be tolerant because he needs
to be the one that Jekyll will open up to about his strange experiences.
There is really no one else who could fulfil that role in the story.
Finally, he needs to be trustworthy but not interesting in himself so
that he doesn’t distract too much from the other characters of the story.
He fills these roles very well and is, in fact, the perfect character
through whom to see the world of the novel. He is not judgmental
(which allows the reader to decide certain things for themselves), he
is trusting of what others tell him (which allows the reader to take
these reports on their own merits) and he is tolerant of others (which
allows Jekyll to tell him and the reader the events of the story). In
short, he is the perfect foil to show off the other characters’ differences
and contrasts.

41
 Part 10: Stevenson’s use of language

One of the difficulties for any Victorian writer, who had to stick to
very strict rules about decency and decorum, was how to describe
things in a way that would shock the reader but also allow them to fill
in the blanks with things that, often, were even more horrific than what
the writer intended. Journalists at the time of the Whitechapel
murders, or the Jack the Ripper murders as they are more commonly
known, were prohibited from describing the actual details of the
deaths of the women involved as it would have broken the decency
laws of the time and be seen as pornographic.
As such, Stevenson had to use language in a very particular way to
create an atmosphere of dread and horror without being too graphic
or explicit. Similarly, when describing dreadful things, he often uses
language which communicates the shocking nature of the event even
though the language used is oddly formal and very much of the
Victorian period. For example, when Hyde’s trampling of the young
girl is described, the fact that such formal language is used almost
makes it even more shocking.
As he retells the events to Utterson, Enfield says that he watched
Hyde and the young girl approaching the same corner but from
different directions. The language used to describe the event itself is
interesting. “Well, Sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough at
the corner” and “the man trampled calmly over the child’s body and
left her screaming on the ground”. Stevenson’s use of the word
“trampled” is vague enough for us to come up with our own vision of
what has happened but also the use of the adverb “calmly” implies
that there was something terrible about the man and it allows us to put
together a picture of both the man and the event without too much
interference of the author’s description.
It is a quite effective technique of introducing ambiguity but also
signposts such as “calmly” “trampled” that force us to create our own
image. In fact, the very next line bears this out. Enfield says that “it
sounds nothing to hear, but it was hellish to see”. This duality or
double nature of the language used - the shocking being described in

42
such formal tones - is reflective of the story itself and its main
character. It’s also linked to the way language is used in other ways in
the story.
Stevenson uses contrast - highlighting the difference between two
things - in a very fitting way for a story about the two different
personalities within a man. In his setting of the scene, Stevenson
repeatedly uses contrast to emphasise the frightening and to create a
dark atmosphere and tone. When describing Enfield and Utterson’s
Sunday walk, he prefaces his description of the location of the mystery
by discussing what’s around it. We are told that the inhabitants of the
area are all “doing well” and hoping to do “better still”. The street
itself “shone out in contrast to its dingy neighborhood, like a fire in a
forest”. Ultimately, just before we come to the scene of the crime (so to
speak) Stevenson gives us a long, rambling sentence about the beauty
and charming nature of the area:

“…With its freshly painted shutters, well-polished brasses, and

general cleanliness and gaiety of note, instantly caught and pleased the
eye of the passenger.”

This allows the next piece of information to have more impact - how
could there possibly be anything negative in such a lovely
environment? But there is:

“Two doors from one corner, on the left hand going east, the line was
broken by the entry of a court; and just at that point, a certain sinister
block of building thrust forward its gable in the street.”

As well as the use of alliteration to emphasise the “certain sinister

block of building”, Stevenson also uses personification to imply that
the house is somehow able to “thrust” itself out onto the pavement
creating the impression of a house or building that personifies the evil
within Hyde himself.
The rest of that passage is worth looking at in detail to examine how
Stevenson carefully builds an atmosphere in direct contrast to what

43
has gone before. This allows the building, upon which the story
centres, to stand out from its surroundings. The building is not
pleasant though it is surrounded by things that are. We could link this
idea to Henry Jekyll who surrounds himself with gentlemen of good
standing even though he himself has a terrible secret to hide.

“It was two storeys and had a blind forehead of discoloured wall on
the upper; and bore in every feature the marks of prolonged and sordid
negligence. The door, which was equipped with neither bell nor knocker,
was blistered and distained. Tramps slouched into the recess and struck
matches on the panels; children kept shop upon the steps; the schoolboy
had tried his knife on the mouldings; and for close on a generation no
one had appeared to drive on these random visitors or to repair their
ravages.”

Stevenson is so detailed in his attempt to set this location up for the

reader as somehow dangerous and sinister. At the beginning it’s
almost as if he’s trying to personify the building with its “blind
forehead”. Is it “blind” because it does not want to see what is going
on inside or outside its walls? We are told that the walls are
“discoloured” - no one is looking after its upkeep. It’s the next
sentence that is particularly interesting however. The word “sordid” is
usually used to suggest something that is morally objectionable. Is the
suggestion here that the buildings occupants are the ones who have
committed the “sordid negligence” and, if so, what is the sordid nature
of their actions?
Although we don’t know yet who lives here, only that it is connected
with the story Enfield is telling Utterson about Hyde, the cumulative
effect of this sort of language is to create an atmosphere suited to the
revealing of a mystery and sets the reader up for the events that
follow.
Considering Stevenson’s fascination with dreams and what he
believed them to reveal about people’s subconscious, the appearance
of a dream sequence or even a dream-like sequence within the novel

44
itself should be read very carefully. And it is in such a sequence that
we get one of the best descriptions of London in the entire novel.
In one such dream when Utterson lay “tossed in the gross darkness
of the room” he sees a “great field of lamps of a nocturnal city”. His
dream from here on becomes infected with the presence of a dark and
sinister shape however, and he sees this shape “glide more
stealthily…through wider labyrinths of lamp-lighted city”. The idea of
the labyrinth or maze and the narrow, lamp-lit streets and alleyways of
London evoke a very sinister and haunting atmosphere for the reader.
When Utterson finally catches up with Hyde, the atmosphere too is
important. It is to be their first meeting and it takes place at night
“under the face of the fogged city moon”. Stevenson describes the
“low growl of London” personifying the city once again as something
animalistic or threatening. When he comes face-to-face with Hyde, he
ultimately concludes that the man “is hardly human”. (For a look at the
language used to describe Hyde by the characters who discuss him
see Character analysis - Mr Edward Hyde).
One final aspect of language to examine is the symbolic nature of
the house and laboratory of Henry Jekyll. As we’ve seen above, the
exterior of the house is described in great detail to develop its sinister
nature but it’s also important to remember that the house represents
both Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (for more on the setting see Setting). The
warren and labyrinth of streets around the back entrance, described
so atmospherically above, prevented people from connecting that
entrance to the property with Dr Jekyll’s front door around on another
side and accessible from a different street. This represents the
relationship between the two characters and also how it’s difficult for
anyone to put them together. Utterson himself is unable to do this until
the very end when all is revealed.

45
 Part 11: Stevenson’s use of structure & form

If the language used by Stevenson in his Jekyll and Hyde reflects the
theme of duality within the novel and of its main character, then the
structure goes even further. Firstly, to the title itself - The Strange case
of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The title gives the impression that some sort
of study or formal report is contained within the pages. As mentioned
earlier (context) Stevenson had been reading scientific and
psychoanalytic articles and journals at the time, detailing “strange
cases” and, as such, his title here reflects the scientific or medical
nature within. It also serves to completely disarm the reader as they
actually encounter something very different to a formal, scientific text.
Of course, this only applies to a first time reader who has no
knowledge of Jekyll and Hyde being the same character, a very rare
thing nowadays.
Firstly, let’s look at the overall structure of the story. For more
detailed information on Freytag’s pyramid, check out Mr Bruff’s guide
to Frankenstein. Here, we can look at the general structure for any
piece of work:

46
And here we see the Jekyll and Hyde fitting quite easily:

Narrative structure
In terms of narrative structure, Jekyll and Hyde uses a number of
different types specifically to build up the tension in the story. There
are three distinct parts or sections to the novel. The first eight chapters
are from the point of view of Mr Utterson, the ninth chapter from the
point of view of Dr Lanyon (a friend of both Utterson and Jekyll) and
the tenth chapter is from the perspective of Dr Jekyll himself. Jekyll
and Hyde, then, is a multiple narrative novel. It’s also non-linear,
meaning that the events that take place are not related to the reader in
the order in which they take place. For example, once we have
switched focus from Mr Utterson to Dr Lanyon in chapter nine, the

47
action goes backwards, to events that we’ve already covered, but seen
from another perspective.
This is interesting for a number of reasons. Firstly, it echoes the
assumptions one might have made based on the title - this is the
testimony or witness statement of three different characters. It would
be expected in any case study that the opinions and ideas of more
than one witness would be included. Secondly, it reflects the subject
matter of the novel itself very well. There’s more than one “voice” or
“personality” at work in the novel and it’s entirely up to us which one
we pay most attention to or believe the most. The duality of the central
character, Dr Jekyll, is reflected in the multiple voices or personalities
within the novel.
Stevenson opens the tale using a third person narrative through the
eyes of the lawyer, Mr Utterson. This is not accidental. As we’ve seen
previously (see Character analysis - Mr Utterson) Mr Utterson is a very
balanced and serious individual who is not someone who jumps to
conclusions or gets carried away. This, in turn, means that we see the
world as he does. He approaches the events in a rational, non-
emotional manner and we tend to follow suit. Utterson is a “safe”
character and one who we would not imagine would become
frightened or nervous easily. This, however, makes the subsequent
events even more shocking as it’s something that, considering the way
we’ve been introduced to this world, we would not have expected at
all.
He is in the dark for most of the novel about the true events taking
place. Because we are restricted to his view, we too are in the dark and
can only share his suspicions about the will, about Mr Hyde and about
the afflictions Dr Jekyll is suffering from. Most of the opening eight
chapters are concerned with Utterson’s theories and hypotheses. As a
lawyer, he’s someone used to taking the facts and combining them
with his own opinions and attempting to come up with an explanation.
This use of the third person narrative from Utterson’s perspective
forces us to distance ourselves from the actual events taking place
with Jekyll and Hyde. We are observers looking in from the outside
trying to figure it out.

48
 Stevenson then does something interesting, however. When he
introduces Dr Lanyon’s narrative he writes in first person, in the form
of a letter. The use of first person narrative removes this distance from
the events and forces us to be up close and personal with Dr Jekyll’s
struggle. It also forces us make a judgement on Jekyll, on whether or
not he is the victim that he appears to present himself as. The fact that
the first person narrator is Dr Lanyon, a friend of Jekyll, makes it easier
to feel sympathy towards him as he is viewed by the narrator with
sympathetic eyes. Another important fact here is that the writer, Dr
Lanyon, is dead so there are no further questions that can be asked;
there can be no further discussion. It’s a closed source.
The third narrative is also written in the first person and it is a first
hand account from Dr Henry Jekyll himself. This narrative is the
closing chapter and, as such, puts an end to the case. Its title too is
interesting: Henry Jekyll’s full statement of the case. Here the non-linear
nature of the novel is emphasised again as we go even further back
when Jekyll’s discussing his upbringing and also his first attempts to
distill this potion that could separate the good and the bad sides of
people. This narrative reads almost like a confession (a type of writing
which was very popular at this time in both prose and poetry) where
Jekyll is appealing to the readers to understand his side of the story.
It’s hard not to feel sympathy and to do as Jekyll seems to be asking: to
see him as the victim of his youth and the society in which he lives.
The combined effect of these narratives is that the novel itself feels
fractured, like it is more than one thing, until you get to the end when
all of the pieces come together to make perfect sense. Stevenson
structures Jekyll and Hyde in this way to create and then build the
tension. It’s like he has a curtain, half drawn, over the story and he is
revealing it very slowly and then going a few steps backwards and
then revealing even more before, finally, giving us the truth of it. It’s a
very effective technique and made even more impressive by
Stevenson’s tight control.

49
 Sentence structure
Finally, let’s take a look at some of the ways that Stevenson
structures language on the sentence and paragraph level. Consider
this passage where Jekyll describes waking up as Hyde. Pay close
attention to how Stevenson carefully structures his writing to take the
reader on a journey from Jekyll’s mind to Hyde’s body and how the
normal and commonplace gradually turn into horror and panic:

Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had been out
for one of my adventures, had returned at a late hour, and woke the next
day in bed with somewhat odd sensations. It was in vain I looked about
me; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall proportions of my room in
the square; in vain that I recognised the pattern of the bed-curtains and
the design of the mahogany frame; something still kept insisting that I
was not where I was, that I had not wakened where I seemed to be, but
in the little room in Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of
Edward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological way began
lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion, occasionally, even as I
did so, dropping back into a comfortable morning doze. I was still so
engaged when, in one of my more wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon
my hand. Now the hand of Henry Jekyll (as you have often remarked)
was professional in shape and size: it was large, firm, white, and comely.
But the hand which I now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a
mid-London morning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean,
corded, knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart
growth of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.

50
Consider the length of the underlined sentence. Here we have our
narrator waking up with “odd sensations”. This is placed at the end of
the first sentence in the passage, setting us up for what is about to
come next. The suspense is built gradually and slowly as we read that
Jekyll carries out all these morning tasks “in vain” before making the
calm decision that this was the room where he was “accustomed to
sleep in the body of Edward Hyde”. This calm acceptance comes at
the end of a long, rambling sentence perhaps reflecting the rambling
thoughts of a man who has just woken up.

The next sentence too is long and uses multiple phrases and
clauses separated by commas to enhance the sensation of laziness,
relaxation and sleepiness. That is until he begins to wake up and
become more aware of the “hand which I now saw, clearly enough, in
the yellow light of a mid-London morning” which he comes to realise
is the hand of none other than Edward Hyde. Notice the sentence in
bold and compare it in length to the other sentences Stevenson uses.
This combination of long, lazy and rambling sentences lulls the
reader into a false sense of security. We are almost dozing like Jekyll
is. The short sentence at the end leaves us in no doubt, however, that
something is terribly wrong and its length emphasises the danger.

51
 Part 12: Sample questions & answers

EXTRACT FOR Q1

Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had

been out for one of my adventures, had returned at a late
hour, and woke the next day in bed with somewhat odd
sensations. It was in vain I looked about me; in vain I saw
the decent furniture and tall proportions of my room in the
square; in vain that I recognised the pattern of the bed-
curtains and the design of the mahogany frame; something
still kept insisting that I was not where I was, that I had not
wakened where I seemed to be, but in the little room in
Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of
Edward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological
way began lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion,
occasionally, even as I did so, dropping back into a
comfortable morning doze. I was still so engaged when, in
one of my more wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my
hand. Now the hand of Henry Jekyll (as you have often
remarked) was professional in shape and size: it was large,
firm, white, and comely. But the hand which I now saw,
clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London
morning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean,
corded, knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with
a swart growth of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.

52
I must have stared upon it for near half a minute, sunk as I
was in the mere stupidity of wonder, before terror woke up
in my breast as sudden and startling as the crash of
cymbals; and bounding from my bed, I rushed to the
mirror. At the sight that met my eyes, my blood was
changed into something exquisitely thin and icy. Yes, I had
gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had awakened Edward Hyde.
How was this to be explained? I asked myself, and then,
with another bound of terror—how was it to be remedied?
It was well on in the morning; the servants were up; all my
drugs were in the cabinet—a long journey down two pairs
of stairs, through the back passage, across the open court
and through the anatomical theatre, from where I was then
standing horror-struck. It might indeed be possible to
cover my face; but of what use was that, when I was unable
to conceal the alteration in my stature? And then with an
overpowering sweetness of relief, it came back upon my
mind that the servants were already used to the coming and
going of my second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I
was able, in clothes of my own size: had soon passed
through the house, where Bradshaw stared and drew back
at seeing Mr. Hyde at such an hour and in such a strange
array; and ten minutes later, Dr. Jekyll had returned to his

53
own shape and was sitting down, with a darkened brow, to
make a feint of breakfasting.

Q1) How does Stevenson make this moment such a fascinating

one in the novel?

A1) Stevenson makes this moment in the novel such a fascinating one
by using vivid imagery to describe the unexpected change from Dr.
Jekyll to Mr. Hyde. Also, this moment is very fascinating and revealing
to the reader because we can finally see Hyde getting more powerful
which could be a premonition to him nearly taking over completely
later on in the novel.

Stevenson makes this moment in the novel fantastic by highly

contrasting the hands of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, symbolizing the
differences between the Victorian Gentleman and the degenerate
beings that swarm the darker parts of London:

‘The hand of Henry Jekyll … was professional in shape and size; it

was large, firm, white and comely … but the hand which I now saw …
was lean, corded, knuckly, of a dusky pallor … with a swart growth of
hair’

The contrasting description of the two hands is shown in this passage

and symbolizes the duality of man, which we can see is a reoccurring
theme throughout the novella. Jekyll’s hand is described as ‘large’ and
‘firm’ which is a reflection of his own body as he is presented as a
large and welcoming figure. This highlights his positive attributes,
which is what is expected of a gentleman in restrictive Victorian
society. His ‘white’ and ‘comely’ hand represents his purity and his
goodwill; he would never harm another human being and his ‘comely’
appearance strengthens his approachability and his highly regarded
position in society, which he strongly sought after. But representing the
darker ‘id’ of ourselves is the description of Hyde's hand which
depicts the gloomier side of humanity. This sudden change in
description makes this moment extremely fantastic. The hand is
described as ‘lean’ and ‘corded’, which conveys the small yet strong
side to Jekyll's soul. The ‘growth’ of ‘hair’ likens Hyde to some

54
primordial ape, which would shock the Victorian readers who believe
they are made in God’s image and are not evolved from apes. This
represents humanity’s bestial nature and signifies how Stevenson’s
trying to fight the duality of man will have severe consequences. The
effects of this adamant behaviour on splitting the soul are seen earlier
in the novella when Jekyll wakes up as Hyde without any otherworld
potion, which marks the dark descent of Jekyll turning irreversibly
into Hyde. The physical alterations are repeatedly mentioned
throughout the novel, usually describing Hyde as having some
unknown ‘deformity’. The differences between the two parts of Jekyll
are extremely strange and fantastic for the reader.

Furthermore, Jekyll’s reaction makes this moment fantastic as it is very

dramatic and it emphasizes the unexpected nature of this
transformation.

‘As sudden and startling as a crash of cymbals… bounding from my

bed…my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin and icy’

This moment is very fantastic as the reader’s disgust and shock is

matched by Jekyll's own dramatic reaction when his ‘blood’ changed
into ‘ic[e]’. This metaphor greatly augments the horror of this
unexpected transformation and how it is getting harder for Jekyll to
control the beast within. The repetition of ‘bounding’ also emphasizes
the shock that Jekyll felt when he realised he’d transformed without
the use of some otherworldly potion. The ‘crash’ of ‘cymbals’ also
augment the suddenness of this change and it allows the reader to
think that Hyde is growing stronger and soon will gain control, due to
Jekyll's stubbornness when he doesn’t accept Hyde as part of himself
and continues trying to get rid of him altogether. This is fantastic as
the reader realises that the ‘id’ is part of the human soul and trying to
split it is breaking apart the duality of man and will have severe
consequences. These sudden changes are also seen earlier in the
novel when we are shown that he has changed in the middle of a park,
in broad daylight, due to vain thoughts.

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Additionally, the contrasting atmospheres in this passage further the
fantastic nature of this passage by strengthening the readers’ and
Jekyll’s shock of the unexpected change from Jekyll to Hyde:

“I smiled to myself…dropping back into a comfortable morning

doze…terror woke up in my breast…bound of terror.”

Stevenson make this moment very exhilarating by contrasting the two

atmospheres in the passage through imagery and description. Firstly,
Jekyll is described to have ‘smiled’ to himself, which has connotations
of extreme happiness and comfort. This could represent the exterior,
superficial Victorian gentlemen ideals. This is augmented when Jekyll
‘dropp[ed]…into’ a ‘morning doze’ which shows us that Jekyll has no
worries at all, and he can calmly go to sleep. This is directly contrasted
when Jekyll’s ‘terror woke up’ inside him. This completely destroys the
idea of the Victorian gentleman as it is the exact opposite of a ‘doze’.
This suggests that there is a darker, more evil, bestial nature inside
everyone. This moment of self-discovery is fantastic for the reader.
This is further amplified by his ‘bound of terror’. The dynamic verb of
‘bound’ accentuates the contrast between a ‘comfortable’ rest and a
terror stricken panic. It also has connotations of an animalistic nature
as it conjures up the image of a primordial degenerate ‘bound[ing]’
from a cage. These two atmospheres could represent the duality of
man, portrayed as the accepted Victorian gentleman, and the feared
‘id’ of our inner self and our true nature. This theme of duality is seen
throughout the novel, including the description of London itself, the
rich ‘fire’ in the forest and the lowlife degenerates who live in the
poorer parts.

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EXTRACT FOR Q2

"Ay, ay," said the lawyer. "My fears incline to the same
point. Evil, I fear, founded—evil was sure to come—of that
connection. Ay, truly, I believe you; I believe poor Harry is
killed; and I believe his murderer (for what purpose, God
alone can tell) is still lurking in his victim's room. Well, let
our name be vengeance. Call Bradshaw."

The footman came at the summons, very white and nervous.

"Pull yourself together, Bradshaw," said the lawyer. "This

suspense, I know, is telling upon all of you; but it is now our
intention to make an end of it. Poole, here, and I are going
to force our way into the cabinet. If all is well, my shoulders
are broad enough to bear the blame. Meanwhile, lest
anything should really be amiss, or any malefactor seek to
escape by the back, you and the boy must go round the
corner with a pair of good sticks and take your post at the
laboratory door. We give you ten minutes to get to your
stations."

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As Bradshaw left, the lawyer looked at his watch. "And now,
Poole, let us get to ours," he said; and taking the poker
under his arm, led the way into the yard. The scud had
banked over the moon, and it was now quite dark. The
wind, which only broke in puffs and draughts into that deep
well of building, tossed the light of the candle to and fro
about their steps, until they came into the shelter of the
theatre, where they sat down silently to wait. London
hummed solemnly all around; but nearer at hand, the
stillness was only broken by the sounds of a footfall moving
to and fro along the cabinet floor.

"So it will walk all day, sir," whispered Poole; "ay, and the
better part of the night. Only when a new sample comes
from the chemist, there's a bit of a break. Ah, it's an ill
conscience that's such an enemy to rest! Ah, sir, there's
blood foully shed in every step of it! But hark again, a little
closer—put your heart in your ears, Mr. Utterson, and tell
me, is that the doctor's foot?"

The steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, for all
they went so slowly; it was different indeed from the heavy
creaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson sighed. "Is there

58
never anything else?" he asked.

Poole nodded. "Once," he said. "Once I heard it weeping!"

"Weeping? how that?" said the lawyer, conscious of a

sudden chill of horror.

"Weeping like a woman or a lost soul," said the butler. "I

came away with that upon my heart, that I could have wept
too."

But now the ten minutes drew to an end. Poole disinterred

the axe from under a stack of packing straw; the candle was
set upon the nearest table to light them to the attack; and
they drew near with bated breath to where that patient foot
was still going up and down, up and down, in the quiet of
the night.

"Jekyll," cried Utterson, with a loud voice, "I demand to see

you." He paused a moment, but there came no reply. "I give
you fair warning, our suspicions are aroused, and I must
and shall see you," he resumed; "if not by fair means, then
by foul! if not of your consent, then by brute force!

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"Utterson," said the voice, "for God's sake, have mercy!"

Q 2) How does Stevenson make this such a tense and dramatic

moment in the novel?

A 2) This is a very tense and dramatic moment in the novel due to the
description of setting and events, which force the reader to feel
suspense and to wonder whatever will happen next. The gothic setting
and the vivid depiction of the characters add to the mystery and
suspense in this passage.

Firstly, the detailed description of the gothic setting in this passage

makes this moment very dramatic, as it forewarns something dark and
otherworldly is going to happen:

“scud had banked over the moon, it was now quite dark… tossed the
light of the candle to and fro…silently to wait”.

This moment is very dramatic due to the heavy use of gothic weather.
The ‘scud’ is described to cover the ‘moon’, which suggests that
darkness is enveloping the house, which has gothic connotations of
evil. The use of light imagery is furthered when the ‘light’ of the
‘candle’ is now the only source of light in the setting, which represents
the fragility of the goodness in the world. The decrease in light also
symbolises the decrease in knowledge on the case of Mr. Hyde. There
is much more confusion, and the reader knows less which adds to the
tension of the moment. The confusion is emulated as the setting is now
‘quite dark’ and Utterson is oblivious to what will greet him inside the
door, which greatly increases the tension in the passage. The reader
will simply have ‘to wait’ to find out. This use of light imagery to

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represent the positive attributes to the human soul and the Victorian
Gentlemen ideal, as well as its superficiality and fragility due to the
darkness enveloping it, is used throughout the novel, especially
earlier on, when the ‘shafts’ of moonlight are only there for a brief
moment and enlighten the desolate streets of London for a fleeting
few seconds. That represents how little the characters realise the
dangers of splitting apart the Victorian Gentlemen ideals and the
bestial needs within.

Additionally, the vivid description of the restlessness of the characters

adds tension to the passage as the reader finds this moment
unnerving as well:

“the footman…very white and nervous…whispered Poole…conscious

of a sudden chill of horror”

The anxiety of the characters in the passage makes the reader feel
the same. This represents the Victorian society’s complete inability to
comprehend anything that is supernatural or which doesn’t conform to
their narrow-minded views and ideals and their abject terror when
meeting anything like it. The ‘footman’ is described as ‘white’ and
‘nervous’ which symbolises his agitation at the thought of confronting
some unexplained abnormality. His ‘white’ skin also represents his
purity which is a stark contrast to the troglodytic monstrosity hiding
behind the door. This edginess is enhanced when Poole ‘whisper[s]’ to
Utterson, not daring to speak aloud. His confusion represents Victorian
society where the unnatural has no part. His fear comes from him not
knowing what is happening. Even Utterson, the ‘austere’ lawyer feels a
‘chill of horror’ due to the gothic nature of what is happening. This
creates great tension in the reader as the reader also doesn’t
understand what is happening and is anxious about what will happen
next. This aversion to anything abnormal in Victorian society is clearly
seen in Lanyon, who, due to his religious views, abhors the idea of
changing or splitting oneself, and doesn’t believe that the Victorian
gentlemen have anything in common with the primordial rabble that
lurk in the poorer parts of Victorian London. Due to his stubbornness,
he died from shock when the truth was unveiled to him. Knowing this

61
beforehand, the reader would feel very tense because they realise
that something gothic and supernatural is going to happen.

Furthermore, the depiction of Hyde and his pathetic, animalistic

characteristics adds tension to the passage as it represents the
vulnerable side to the human soul:

“once I heard it weeping…for God’s sake have mercy”

This moment is very dramatic as the reader finally understands what

is behind the door. Its weakness and Utterson’s stubbornness at not
trying to understand, makes this very tense. The reader almost
sympathises with Hyde due to his vulnerability. Hyde was said to have
‘we[pt]’, which shows us that he is in a state of shock and panic. But
due to Victorian views, there is no ‘mercy’ for him and Utterson doesn’t
listen, causing him to commit suicide, which is very tense for the
reader. The cruelty is amplified when Hyde pleads for ‘mercy’,
likening him to an innocent, wounded animal. It is slightly ironic as he
is asking for ‘God’s…mercy’ but it is due to the religious views of
Victorian society that there is no compromise with this unnatural
creature, which also creates sympathy from the reader. This non-
tolerance of unholy creatures is seen earlier in the play where
everyone describes him as having some ‘unknown deformity’ and he
has no place in the ‘perfect’, superficial society of Victorian England.

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EXTRACT FOR Q3

"Did you ever remark that door?" he asked; and when his
companion had replied in the affirmative, "It is connected
in my mind," added he, "with a very odd story."

"Indeed?" said Mr. Utterson, with a slight change of voice,

"and what was that?"

"Well, it was this way," returned Mr. Enfield: "I was coming
home from some place at the end of the world, about three
o'clock of a black winter morning, and my way lay through
a part of town where there was literally nothing to be seen
but lamps. Street after street, and all the folks asleep—
street after street, all lighted up as if for a procession and
all as empty as a church—till at last I got into that state of
mind when a man listens and listens and begins to long for
the sight of a policeman. All at once, I saw two figures: one

63
a little man who was stumping along eastward at a good
walk, and the other a girl of maybe eight or ten who was
running as hard as she was able down a cross street. Well,
sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough at the
corner; and then came the horrible part of the thing; for the
man trampled calmly over the child's body and left her
screaming on the ground. It sounds nothing to hear, but it
was hellish to see. It wasn't like a man; it was like some
damned Juggernaut. I gave a view-halloa, took to my heels,
collared my gentleman, and brought him back to where
there was already quite a group about the screaming child.
He was perfectly cool and made no resistance, but gave me
one look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat on me like
running. The people who had turned out were the girl's own
family; and pretty soon, the doctor, for whom she had been
sent, put in his appearance. Well, the child was not much
the worse, more frightened, according to the Sawbones;
and there you might have supposed would be an end to it.
But there was one curious circumstance. I had taken a
loathing to my gentleman at first sight. So had the child's
family, which was only natural. But the doctor's case was
what struck me. He was the usual cut-and-dry apothecary,
of no particular age and colour, with a strong Edinburgh
accent, and about as emotional as a bagpipe. Well, sir, he

64
was like the rest of us; every time he looked at my prisoner,
I saw that Sawbones turn sick and white with the desire to
kill him. I knew what was in his mind, just as he knew what
was in mine; and killing being out of the question, we did
the next best. We told the man we could and would make
such a scandal out of this, as should make his name stink
from one end of London to the other. If he had any friends
or any credit, we undertook that he should lose them. And
all the time, as we were pitching it in red hot, we were
keeping the women off him as best we could, for they were
as wild as harpies. I never saw a circle of such hateful faces;
and there was the man in the middle, with a kind of black,
sneering coolness—frightened too, I could see that—but
carrying it off, sir, really like Satan.

Q3) How does this moment in the novel imply to the reader the
evil nature of Mr. Hyde?

A3) This moment in the novel strongly implies to the reader, the dark,
pure evil nature of Mr. Hyde. We are presented a scene in which he
injures an innocent child, which is enhanced through vivid imagery
and description.

Firstly, the depiction of the gothic weather in the passage conveys that
something bad is going to happen and it prolongs the wait and builds
up the suspense and dread of the crime, which augments its evil
nature:

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“3 o’clock of a black winter morning…empty as a church…long for
the sight of a policeman…”

The use of a ‘3 o’clock’ time could refer to the ‘demon hour’ where evil
is at its most powerful. This could be premonition of a supernatural,
evil event about to occur. Also, a ‘black winter morning’ is a use of
pathetic fallacy, and it uses light imagery, or the lack of it, to represent
the hopelessness of the situation and how something malicious is
about to happen. The simile, describing the setting as ‘empty as a
church’ is a continuation of the religious theme. This shows that the
faith in God has diminished and the devil is growing stronger and evil
beings, like Hyde with the ‘Devil’s signature’ on his ‘face’ are going to
attack. It can also be interpreted as part of the theme science vs.
religion and this people, like Lanyon, have lost their ‘faith’ in God, from
seeing a troglodytic monster like Hyde. This heightens Hyde’s
malevolent nature as he is portrayed as powerful enough to destroy
religious and Victorian ‘made in God’s own image’ beliefs. Finally, the
‘long[ing] for the sight of the policeman, suggests that some heinous
crime is about to happen, and a policeman’s presence would provide
some comfort in the situation. The fact that all this malevolence is
shown through different interpretations before Hyde is even seen,
strengthens our perception of his pure, evil nature.

Furthermore, the description of the attack itself is very merciless and

horrific, and this makes the attacker, Mr. Hyde, seem extremely
wicked:

“trampled calmly over the child’s body… left her screaming on the
ground…it was hellish to see…like some damned juggernaut”

Hyde is described to have ‘calmly’ ‘trampled’ a ‘child’. This is very

horrific is it shows that he has no remorse over the fact that he hurt an
innocent child. The use of ‘body’ almost makes it seem like she is
already dead, and he is defiling her broken ‘body’. His merciless
nature is further seen when the child is depicted as ‘screaming on the
ground’. This evokes sympathy from the reader for the child and hate
for Mr. Hyde. This imagery is shocking and it causes the reader to
realise how evil Hyde is. Describing the attack as ‘hellish’ further

66
enhances Hyde’s satanic descriptions and how he is the embodiment
of the Devil, from a religious point of view. This would have been
especially traumatic for the Victorian reader as they were particularly
religious. This biblical description is continued when he is described
as a ‘damned juggernaut’. This implies that even God has forsaken this
creature and he is an unstoppable force of evil that no-one can
restrain. This attack can also be a premonition of Carew’s death, where
he also is brutally attacked, but this time murdered as well, by the evil
Hyde.

Additionally, the effect of Hyde’s presence on other people, such as

Enfield, is seen as very powerful and influential, and causes innocent
people to think in warped, unjustified ways which shows the potency
of his evil nature:

“turned sick and white with the desire to kill him…circle of such
hateful faces…wild as harpies…like Satan”

The doctor is described to have turned ‘sick and white’ and wanted to
‘kill’ Hyde. A doctor is usually a caring figure, wanting to help people
so this juxtaposition of doctor and ‘kill’ conveys to us how influential
and addictive Hyde’s evilness is. Portraying him as ‘sick’ could further
the idea of Hyde’s inner ‘id’ infecting other people. The use of the first
person narrative really helps here as we can see Enfield's mind
becoming warped every second, starting from describing them as a
‘family’ which later turned into a ‘circle’ of ‘hateful faces. This could be
a reference to the seven circles of hell. It could also symbolise how the
evilness is surrounding the good and is overcoming them. The use of
biblical monsters is furthered when he describes the women as ‘wild
as harpies’ which could represent how strong Hyde’s evil nature is to
be able to turn other, innocent human beings into a tainted
monstrosity, ‘like Satan’.

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68