More handpicked essays just for you.
The strange case of dr jekyll and mr hyde house symbolic
Dr jekyll and mr hyde good vs evil analysis
Introduction dr jekyll and mr hyde
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Background of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was published in 1886 and is
one of the best known of Stevenson's novels. It concerns the way in
which an individual is made up of contrary emotions and desires: some
good and some evil. Through the curiosity of Utterson, a lawyer, we
learn of the ugly and violent Mr Hyde and his odd connection to the
respectable Dr Jekyll who pays out a cheque for Hyde's despicable
behaviour. A brutal murder follows. The dead man is one of Utterson's
clients, Sir Danvers Carew. The murder weapon was, unbelievably a cane
Utterson had given to Jekyll. As such, the lawyer becomes entangled in
the strange world of the physician Jekyll who it transpires has
created a drug that separates his good and evil natures - purifying
the doctor himself but with the ghastly side effect of periods spent
as the monstrous Hyde. We follow Utterson as he investigates with
Poole, Jekyll's butler, the seeming contradictions in the doctor's
actions and his increasingly hermit-like existence in his laboratory.
As the truth is about to surface, tragic events occur that end the
whole affair dramatically and conclusively. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was
a great success and it followed 1883's fame-bringing Treasure Island
(Stevenson's first full-length novel).
Background on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde:
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was written at Bournemouth
in 1885, when Robert Louis Stevenson was convalescing from an illness.
The original idea occurred from a nightmare, from which...
... middle of paper ...
...nd spiritual change, after many decades of
confident growth
and national self-fulfillment. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde perfectly
captured some readers' fears that
their carefully built society was hypocritical. Stevenson was aware of
the new ideas about
economics, science, and the workings of the mind. To many readers, Dr
Jekyll and Mr Hyde was a
symbolic representation of these threats to traditional British
society. Political reforms had given
many more men the right to vote, and the working classes were
beginning to flex their political
muscles. Karl Marx's ideas about the struggle for power among the
different social classes were
becoming more influential. To some of Britain's upper-class readers,
the character of Edward Hyde
represented the increasing political power of the working class.