1026 stevenson, Robert Louis
From an early age, Jekyll finds it hard to reconcile
his “impatient gaiety of disposition” with a need to
wear a “grave countenance” in public; consequently,
he hides his “undignified” pleasures and becomes
“committed to a profound duplicity of life.” His
scientific studies shed light on his problem, and lead
him to the conclusion “that man is not truly one, but
truly two”; indeed, he thinks that future research-
ers will discover that individuals contain multiple
personalities. Because of his condition, he believes
that the “provinces of good and ill which divide
and compound man’s dual nature” are severed in his
own character to a greater degree than with most
individuals, and he dreams of a way of separating
these elements. If good and evil can be “housed in
separate identities,” he thinks, the bad can indulge in
sinful pleasures without feeling guilty, and the good
can lead virtuous lives without the danger of being
disgraced by their darker halves. Devoting himself to
discovering a way of separating these halves, Jekyll
concocts a drug that shakes “the very fortress of
identity,” transforming him into Edward Hyde.
Jekyll now has “two characters as well as two
appearances.” Hyde represents his bestial side: He is
a man of savage, primitive desires. Though “smaller,
slighter and younger” than Jekyll, his “wholly evil”
nature leaves an “imprint of deformity and decay”
on his body, which repulses those with whom he
comes into contact. Jekyll, however, is “conscious
of no repugnance”; instead, he considers Hyde an
integral and natural part of his identity: “This too
was myself.” Once he is sure he has not “lost [his]
identity beyond redemption” and can change back
to his “original and better self,” Jekyll enjoys acts of
“vicarious depravity” through Hyde. He claims that
“it was Hyde . . . and Hyde alone, that was guilty,”
but he is aware that the acts he is committing are
wrong, which proves that he cannot cut himself
off from his conscience. Over time, the transfor-
mations become involuntary, and Jekyll fears that
“the balance of [his] nature might be permanently
overthrown.” In an effort to check Hyde’s ascen-
dancy, he abstains from drinking the transforming
potion for two months, but he eventually gives in to
temptation. Enraged because he has been caged for
so long, Hyde kills Carew, an important Member
of Parliament.
Jekyll and Hyde comprise an extreme case of
a condition that also affects the story’s secondary
characters. Jekyll’s friend Utterson, for example, has
a past that is “fairly blameless,” but he is “humbled to
the dust by the many ill things he had done.” Utter-
son’s cousin Enfield is also suspect. In recounting his
meeting with Hyde, he describes himself as “coming
home from some place at the end of the world, about
three o’clock of a black winter morning,” which
implies that he has been indulging in some sort of
secret vice. Lanyon does not escape censure, either.
Despite describing Jekyll’s experiments as “unsci-
entific balderdash,” he cannot disguise his curiosity
at the possibility of “fame and power,” which Hyde
holds out to him. Like Jekyll, all of these men have
hidden sides to their personalities: There is a great
difference between appearance and reality, public
and private selves.
Although he denied that his story had an explicit
moral, Stevenson seems to be suggesting that “all
human beings . . . are commingled out of good and
evil,” and that in order to maintain social order, we
must uphold the better part of our identities by
listening to our consciences and exercising restraint.
Conscience is a crucial aspect of identity and an
important factor in our final estimation of the tale.
When Jekyll undergoes his last transformation into
Hyde, Hyde commits suicide, but his reasons for
doing so are ambiguous. Does he kill himself out
of fear of the gallows? Or does conscience triumph,
and is there enough of Jekyll left to force his evil half
to take his own life?
P. B. GrantIndIvIduaL and SocIety in The Strange Case
of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
The relationship between the individual and society
drives the plot of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde, because Jekyll’s scientific experiments are
motivated by his frustration with societal norms and
a desire to throw off the constraints of Victorian
respectability and responsibility.
In his chosen field of medicine, Jekyll is “well
known and highly considered,” with a name that
is “often printed” in the London newspapers. He is
regarded as being “the very pink of the proprieties”
and is “fond of the respect of the wise and good