Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde What does this

‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ What does this title mean to you?

Does ‘The Strange Case…’ suggest anything more?

Doppelganger German word literally translated ‘double-goer’. ‘An apparition or double of a living person’.

What would YOUR doppelganger be like? Appearance? Personality?

‘Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde’ was written at a time when the concept of a ‘double-self’ or ‘twin’ and the idea that things are not always as they appear were discussed and explored in literature.

‘Frankenstein’ by Mary Shelley Published 1818

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde By Robert Louis Stevenson Published 1886

‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ by Oscar Wilde Published 1891

The theme of ‘the double’ • The two faces of Edinburgh • Stevenson’s own double life • Darwin’s ‘The Origin of the Species’

The Two Faces Of Edinburgh The prosperous, middle class New Town where Stevenson grew up.

The Two Faces of Edinburgh • The ‘old black city’ with its poverty, disease and overcrowding. • Much of the novel takes place at night. The characters come and go either late at night or in the early hours of the morning.

William ‘Deacon’ Brodie • Edinburgh had a dark past that fed the young Stevenson’s imagination and taste for horror. • The story of William Brodie, well respected craftsman by day, criminal by night & hanged in 1788 interested Stevenson. In his bedroom he had a cabinet made by Brodie.

Stevenson’s own double life • When he was 17 and studying engineering at Edinburgh University, Robert Louis spent a lot of time in the Old Town. • It is argued that he, like Jekyll, was leading a double life- respectable by day, debauched at night.

The Church • Although he enjoyed this bohemian lifestyle, his witnessing of these double standards made him determined to avoid hypocrisy and to react against the strict Scottish Presbyterian background which he felt created it. • Through the teaching of his strongly Presbyterian nanny, Stevenson was given the impression that the church saw things as very black and white- there are ‘good’ people and ‘bad’ people. Stevenson refutes this in ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ and argues that there is good and bad in all mankind.

‘The Origin of the Species’ • Published in 1859. • The unpalatable theory that man had descended from apes. • Stevenson used this controversial idea and wanted to introduce his ideas about the ‘beast in man’ and the attempts to hide, if not subdue, animal passions. • Victorian society was strict- you had to hide secret desires in public and indulge them at night.

Repressed Sexual Desire • Especially prey to these animal passions were men who believed that they could exist perfectly well ‘without the aid of women’, men like Enfield, Utterson, Layton and Jekyll. • There are repeated references to locked doors, cabinets and secret chambers reinforcing the idea that the beast must not only be hidden but imprisoned. • ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ is partly about sexual repression but the subject of sex is never explicitly mentioned in the novel.

Jack the Ripper • Jack the Ripper killed five prostitutes within two years of Stevenson’s novel being published and at the same time that a dramatised version was playing in the West End. • People got confused, could not remember which came first, and some blamed Stevenson for inspiring the murders.