To look at the duality in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Macbeth. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde: In this essay, I am going to look at the idea of duality means an instance of opposition or contrast between two concepts of two aspects of something: a dualism. This is expressed in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by means of Dr Jekyll being good and gentlemanly, it is the Victorian times after all, where reputation and respect were very important, and Mr Hyde being evil and uncouth, which is the opposite of Dr Hyde. Reputation was important, if you were married you were not allowed to hire prostitutes as it would damage their reputation. Mr Utterson: Mr Utterson is described as lovable and friendly but also described as dreary and never lighted by a smile, this shows …show more content…
He is used to upper class and good looking citizens, which Mr Hyde is neither. This makes me have a dislike for Mr Hyde as he seems rude and Dr Lanyon’s for judging him by the way he looks. The description of his clothes being “enormously too large for him,” because of his small and ape like structure, further supporting Lombroso’s theory. This gives me an image of a small ugly person in hulk-likes clothes, hunched over, untrustworthy, a person hiding in big clothes. “Abnormal and misbegotten,” These are the words that Dr Lanyon would describe Mr Hyde, as if he is hiding something and all is not normal or right. This confirms my suspicion that Mr Hyde should not be …show more content…
Lady Macbeth takes on the traditional role of the masculine, as she is the one who encourages Macbeth to commit regicide. She describes him as ‘too full of the milk of human kindness,’ Lady Macbeth says this because she wants Macbeth and her to be in power. Lady Macbeth is mocking his manhood to goad him into murdering King Duncan to assume power. The effect this has on Macbeth is a negative one, as it makes him paranoid and insane. The reason he took notice is that he could not let Lady Macbeth seem like more of a man than him, so he went through with the
Hyde. The maid does not grant us anything new, but for a comparison between Mr. Hyde and “an aged beautiful gentleman with white hair” (p.20) Having two descriptions so close we cannot deny the difference between them.
In Robert Louis Stevenson’s, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dr. Jekyll’s struggle between two personalities is the cause of tragedy and violence. Dr. Jekyll takes his friends loyalty and unknowingly abuses it. In this novella, Stevenson shows attributes of loyalty, how friendship contributes to loyalty, and how his own life affected his writing on loyalty.
Arguably on of the biggest themes is the duality of human nature. Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde “…embraces the notion of duality in man and the presence of unconscious impulse” (D’Amato 93). In the song “Jekyll and Hyde,” the artist “wear[s] a smile on his face, but there’s a demon inside [him]” (“Jekyll and Hyde”). He goes about his day, seeming content on the outside, but inside there is something evil inside of him. This is his duality; the same duality Jekyll has. In all of the film and television adaptations, there is a duality to the Jekyll
The story The Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde expresses duality because in the story Jekyll and Hyde are the same person. They just have vastly different characteristics that show at one time.We all have two different sides to us. One good and one bad side. The side that decides to show itself is the side that you have come to accept more and more over time. In the story The Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr.Hyde when Jekyll is talking about in the final chapter what is was like turning into Mr.Hyde he described it as “Doing the good things he found pleasure in no longer exposed themselves” (Stevenson 75) which meant he liked this feeling of being evil. Also he said “I felt younger and happier in body”(Stevenson 77) Jekyll felt like he completely recreated himself when he would
... man. Society in the Victorian era was consisted of two classes, trashy and wealthy. Jekyll was expected to be a gentleman, but he wanted to have fun. This was the reason he created Hyde, so he could both be respected and have fun. He was delighted at the freedom he now had. Lanyon was overly contolled, but Utterson knew all men had both good and bad within them and could control it. In Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson, the dual nature of man is a main theme.
In Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Hyde becomes Jekyll's demonic, monstrous alter ego. Certainly Stevenson presents him immediately as this from the outset. Hissing as he speaks, Hyde has "a kind of black sneering coolness . . . like Satan". He also strikes those who witness him as being "pale and dwarfish" and simian like. The Strange Case unfolds with the search by the men to uncover the secret of Hyde. As the narrator, Utterson, says, "If he be Mr. Hyde . . . I shall be Mr. Seek". Utterson begins his quest with a cursory search for his own demons. Fearing for Jekyll because the good doctor has so strangely altered his will in favor of Hyde, Utterson examines his own conscience, "and the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded a while in his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, lest by chance some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there" (SC, 42). Like so many eminent Victorians, Utterson lives a mildly double life and feels mildly apprehensive about it. An ugly dwarf like Hyde may jump out from his own boxed self, but for him such art unlikely creature is still envisioned as a toy. Although, from the beginning Hyde fills him with a distaste for life (SC, 40, not until the final, fatal night, after he storms the cabinet, can Utterson conceive of the enormity of Jekyll's second self. Only then does he realize that "he was looking on the body of a self-dcstroyer" (SC, 70); Jekyll and Hyde are one in death as they must have been in life.
“When you first do it, then you were a man, And to be more than what you were, you would, be so much more the man” (I. VII, 54-56). After struggling with the thought of killing Duncan, Macbeth is reprimanded by Lady Macbeth for his lack of courage. She informs him that killing the king will make him a man, insinuating that he isn’t a man if he doesn’t go through with the murder. This develops Lady Macbeth as a merciless, nasty, and selfish woman. She will say, or do anything to get what she desires, even if it means harming others.
Initially, when her character is introduced, she displays her masculine traits with complete disregard for any form of femininity. She commands the heavens in these lines, ”Come, you spirits/That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,/And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full/Of direst cruelty.”(1.5.30-33). In this, Lady Macbeth sheds any attachment she has to her natural embodiment as a woman, and asks the supernatural to help her in her quest to power. It is clearly shown that Lady Macbeth yearns to achieve ambitions that weren’t considered womanly in the time period that this play is set in. As a consequence, she pushes her husband to fulfill her horrendous dreams, because she knows that she will not be affected if Macbeth fails to execute his plans. If Macbeth gets caught, then she remains blameless, and if he doesn’t, she becomes a queen. Either way she doesn’t get hurt. Nonetheless, Lady Macbeth hides another aspiration, one which is evidenced from her humane actions. As a loyal companion to Macbeth, Lady Macbeth wants to ensure that her husband achieves his dream, to be king, at any cost, even if that means sacrificing her femininity and humanity. Generally speaking, this unique perspective on Lady Macbeth shows that her demeaning of Macbeth’s masculinity is actually a display of her true feminine traits; to always support her husband regardless of the price. Lady
Dual-Self Characters in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and A Study in Scarlet and Sign of Four
Macbeth tells himself to act like a man in the following lines: “Prithee, peace! / I dare do all that may become a man; / Who dares do more is none” (I, vii, 45-47). This quote by Macbeth shows how he wants to be a man by killing King Duncan, but he does not think this would be an act of righteousness. Macbeth is in a controversy with himself in this situation. If he does not kill the king then his wife, Lady Macbeth, will not think he is a man, but if he does kill the king then he will betray his leader’s trust in him. Betrayal would not be seen as an act of manliness. Jarold Ramsey explains the situation in the following sentence: “And, striking more ruthlessly at him, she scornfully implies that his very sexuality will be called into question in her eyes if he refuses the regicide” (288). This quote by Jarold Ramsey explains how Macbeth’s manliness will be determined in the eyes of Lady Macbeth when he makes his decision on whether or not he will kill the king. Lady Macbeth shows her desire of being queen in the following lines: “What beast was’t then / That made you break this enterprise to me? /When you durst do it, then you were a man” (I, vii, 47-49). This quote shows how she wants Macbeth to kill the king. In this situation Macbeth tells himself to be a man and kill the king to please Lady Macbeth. Maria Howell exp...
The story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a confusing and perplexing one. R.L. Stevenson uses the devices of foreshadow and irony to subtly cast hints to the reader as to who Mr. Hyde is and where the plot will move. Stevenson foreshadows the events of the book through his delicate hints with objects and words. Irony is demonstrated through the names of characters, the names display to the reader how the character will fit into the novel. These two literary devices engage the readers; they employ a sense of mystery while leading the readers to the answer without them realizing the depth of each indirect detail.
Stevenson’s most prominent character in the story is the mysterious Mr Hyde. Edward Hyde is introduced from the very first chapter when he tramples a young girl in the street, which brings the reader’s attention straight to his character. The reader will instantly know that this person is a very important part of this book and that he plays a key role in the story. This role is the one of a respectable old man named Dr Jekyll’s evil side or a ‘doppelganger’. This links in with the idea of duality. Dr Jekyll is described as being ‘handsome’, ‘well-made’ and ‘smooth-faced’. On the other hand, Mr Hyde is described as being ‘hardly human’, ‘pale and dwarfish’, giving of an impression of deformity and ‘so ugly that it brought out the sweat on (Mr Enfield) like running’! These words all go together to conjure up an image in the mind of an animal, beast or monster. During the novel...
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’s representation in society through architecture is representative of how the ideas of innocence and corruption would have affected English society at the time and how they would have informed English cultural anxieties. For instance, in “Henry Jekyll’s Full Statement of the Case”, he outlines how he wants to be viewed in society and how that affected his actions. He admitted, “with even a deeper trench than in the majority of men, served in those provinces of good and ill which divide and compound man’s dual nature” (76). Dr. Jekyll means that due to how he wanted people to view him, he divided himself into two people so that people could judge him on just his façade and not his actual desires. The imagery he uses is profound because his identity is tied to geography and the idea of a province is used as a metaphor to describe this relationship he has with good and evil. He references a trench, which visually also creates an image of the split he experiences. The good and evil which he describes ‘divide and compound man’s dual nature’ mean that while he split himself in two, the pieces both add to this one composite whole where Dr. Jekyll is a façade to control Mr. Hyde. Architecture aids him in this transition from innocent to corrupt. Additionally, Wedgewood states that “It is a psychological curiosity that the same man should have written both, and if they were bound up together, the volume would form the most striking illustration of a warning necessary for others besides the critic-- the warning to judge no man by any single utterance” (136). Her statement seems hypocritical because she is praising him and adding to his good reputation as a person and author. Due to the fact that Stevenson is male and of a higher class, her argument states that it is the desire of the readers to trust him. This aspect of society is exactly what Stevenson critiques. He claims that people judge the façades of people and buildings instead of what goes on
After receiving prophecies from the witches about his future to come, he is forced into an ambition-fuelled madness. As previously mentioned, Macbeth was persuaded to kill King Duncan by his wife due to his debatable manliness. This presented Macbeth’s need to prove to his wife he was manly by being valiant and strong and partaking in violent acts. He responds to his wife’s forceful directives by telling her, “Please stop! I dare do all that may become a man;/ Who dares do more is none” (1.7.46-47). This quote indicates how Macbeth believes a “real” man would not murder, and only due to Lady Macbeth explicitly attempting to manipulate him into action, does he succumb to do so. Macbeth endeavours the heinous crime of murdering the King, all owing to Lady Macbeth’s commands. On more than one occasion Macbeth is seen becoming mad, being overtaken by guilt and concern, highlighting that his manhood does not in fact give him any power, but only draws attention to his lack thereof. The inferiority he has within his relationship, also makes evident that Lady Macbeth’s pressure causes the transpiration of Macbeth’s powerful future. It is clear that Macbeth’s power was affected by his gender, as seen through his desperate need to prove his masculinity. Without the questioning of his manhood, Macbeth would have still been the
Shakespeare is known for strong male heroes, but they are not laying around in this play, not that Macbeth is full of strong female heroines, either. The women in the play, Lady Macbeth and the witches have very uncommon gender belief, and act as inhumane as the men. While the men engage in direct violence, the women use manipulation to achieve their desires. As Lady Macbeth impels Macbeth to kill King Duncan, she indicated that she must take on some sort of masculine characteristic in order to process the murder. “Come, you spirits/ that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, / and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full/ of direst cruelty.” (i v 31-34) This speech is made after she reads Macbeth’s letter. Macbeth, she has shown her desire to lose her feminine qualities and gain masculine ones. Lady Macbeth's seizure of the dominant role in the Macbeth's marriage, on many occasions, she rules her husband and dictates his actions. Her speeches in the first part of the book give the readers a clear impression. “You shall put this night’s great business into my dispatch, which shall […] gi...