Now known by slight variations of the above title, this is the original title of Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella, which created such a powerful impact as to make ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ a universal synonym for split personality!
The story of the London lawyer Gabriel John Utterson who investigates the weird events involving his friend Dr Henry Jekyll and the evil Mr Edward Hyde is, of course, known to all - and on that count there was no element of surprise (what a thrill it would have been for a first time reader!) But this is where the brilliance of the tale and its telling comes in: as the story progresses from a sensational murder mystery to the shocking revelation of a dual personality, each event and every unravelling got me into it deeper and deeper - despite the fact that I knew what the big twist was!
At the heart of this story is a brutal murder and the subsequent investigation, which brings to light the mysterious relation between Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. I found the investigation to be very interesting. Small incidents took the story to very exciting levels, example, when Jekyll gives a note to Utterson, claiming it was “hand-delivered from Hyde” - and Utterson asks Poole to describe the messenger, only to be told that there had been none, and Jekyll’s subsequent conversation with handwriting expert Mr. Guest!
Another feature that I found really interesting was the fact that the decent Dr Jekyll was very tall and well built, whereas the evil Mr Hyde was a small man, almost drowning in Jekyll’s clothes! Normally (and I’m thinking mainly of the Hulk when I say this) any time a normal person transforms into a raging monster, he becomes a giant - he doesn’t shrink into a small, and worse, deformed man.
A disturbing trampling death of a young girl. A brutal beating death of renowned MP Sir Danvers Carew. The sudden and unexplained death of Dr Hastie Lanyon. Seemingly unrelated philanthropic acts by Jekyll … This story follows such an extraordinary arc as it tracks Dr Jekyll’s mind: from a logical desire to separate the two consciousnesses that all humans are made up of (what a fantastic theory!) - to a slow loss of control - to an attempt at undoing some of the damage done by Hyde - to being completely overwhelmed by the power of evil - to the very tragic end of this sad and horrific tale.
“I incline to Cain’s heresy, I let my brother go to the devil in his own way.”
I loved having Hyde as smaller than Jekyll as well. There was something behind the idea that Jekyll's evil is small and ill-formed...perhaps if the doctor lived long enough, Mr Hyde would have began to grow in stature?
ReplyDelete(yay, my first comment!) Yeah, I actually had to go back and re-read the section when they first mentioned Hyde being smaller that Jekyll – I thought I read it wrong! Interesting thought about what could / would happen to Hyde after the ‘death’ of Jekyll... I think perhaps he would grow, in a physical manifestation of the growth and ultimate triumph of evil.
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