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At this point in the story, Dr. Jekyll has not completely accepted Edward Hyde as being a part of him. He recognizes that Edward Hyde is “pure evil” but needs further proof that so much evil can be part of a person that is good. The story describes his transformation after drinking the potion as mental, physical, and spiritual. The spiritual part is very interesting because Dr. Jekyll in part always thought he was a fraud and even though he did walk the line of good he expected he was not truly good. I think Hyde was a manifestation of his thoughts of impurity because deep down he believed to have a good soul he must never have impure thoughts. I think this was his true…
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Dr. Jekyll tells the story of how he turned into Hyde in chapter 9. It began as “scientific curiosity in the duality of human nature”, and his attempt to destroy the “darker self”. He then became addicted to being Hyde, which was not good because it took over and destroyed him.…
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The victorian era commanded Dr. Jekyll to repress his inner persona, in both his public and private life's. Leaving Dr. Jekyll with a choice, to repress himself and be respected as a professional, or to let himself flourish and be seen as unrespectable and a bit maniacal. By creating Mr. Hyde Dr. Jekyll believes that he has solved his problem of inner repression cause by the culture forced upon him. While in reality, by constructing Mr. Hyde Dr. Jekyll is inevitably driving himself to insanity, and developing case of dissociative identity disorder (DID). Both leading to Dr. Jekyll's impending…
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Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” is a representation of the social problems which many individuals face in the Victorian era. His character Dr. Jekyll is an accurate representation of how society expects an individual to be, however, his character Mr. Hyde displays the many ways people in the upper class rebel. A percentage of the public such as single women, immigrants, and the lower class have a strenuous time adapting to society and its expectations, causing them to be viewed as different and eventually being labelled as mentally ill or unstable. Stevenson depicts many characteristics of mental illness through his characters Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and educates his readers about the problems individuals are facing daily in the Victorian era and how it effects the contributions and productivity of the lower class. Society expectations increases pressure and anxiety on individuals, causing them to feel trapped, which can result in them rebelling as a way to release their frustration and obtain social freedom. Robert Louis Stevenson creates the characters Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with the intention of portraying these social issues that took place in the Victorian era, including mental illness and addiction, and how it significantly impacts and influences Dr. Jekyll’s behaviour and his temptations to…
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When Jekyll experiences improper urges he uses Hyde as an outlet to protect his reputability, resulting in a blurred line between illusion and reality, as well as a shattered self-perception. Jekyll created Hyde as an experiment to try and contribute to the scientific community of the Victorian Era. But once he discovers that he can use Hyde as channel into the feelings he has repressed, he loses his sense of self, only finding it again when he realizes that Hyde has gone too far. Jekyll holds in his feelings to ensure that he is achieving the level of propriety that is expected in Victorian times, choosing to bottle up his desires, and Hyde becomes his scapegoat. But after acting on his desires, Jekyll realizes that there must be some evil in him, and it devastates his self-perception, calling into question who he once thought Henry Jekyll was.…
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After Hyde, having “trampled calmly” over a little girl, he speaks in a sincere manner and offers compensation for his acts. Hyde appears to have a self-loving attitude. He dedicates himself to egotistic desires- violence and savagery- in a sense, fulfilling his need for both love and hate. Because Dr. Jekyll still attains memory of Hyde’s erroneous actions, like that of trampling the little girl, he responds to both emotions of love and hate, since he is in his state of normality. Only, Dr. Jekyll appears to be more subdued about his passions, desires, and emotions. Dr. Jekyll does this to conform to society so he is not at risk of losing his high social status. Although Hyde is more liberating, while Dr. Jekyll is more moderate, this allows the two binary opposites of love and hate to be balanced…
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According to the Victorian era’s traditions that everything should be sober and dignified, the society was forced to have no sexual appetites, violence, and no great expressions of emotion underlying the enthusiasms which would somehow take away from people‘s focus on morality which reflected in Mr. Utterson’s characters that “that was never lighted by a smile” and also Mr. Enfield when he stated "I feel very strongly about putting questions; it partakes too much of the style of the day of judgment”. These stimulate the repressions which is a cause of Dr. Jekyll’s struggling in the pursuit of happiness. The more Dr. Jekyll’s forbidden appetites are repressed, the more he desires the life of Mr. Hyde, and the stronger Mr. Hyde grows.…
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Repressed desires will be satisfied in some way shape or form. An outlet will be found, and deeper darker forces will arise. Dr. Jekyll’s deeper darker forces come forth after years of his persona not acceptable in the eyes of others being repressed because of the pain that desires cause. In Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the repression of Dr. Jekyll’s alter ego eats away at him; for the repression of this other being can no longer be caged. Through the repression and absolution of his deepest desires, Dr. Jekyll’s desire for unattainable perfection in the eyes of his peers, dissection of good and evil within himself, and acceptance into society without worry of his darker side being found out…
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Civility and propriety have been the staples of peaceful civilizations for thousands of years. these civilizations thrived due to mans ability to stifle and suppress our baser urges, to bury all that is primal and impulsive beneath fine clothing and proper etiquette. however, this beast that is the true instinct of all men yet lives just behind weary or angry eyes, waiting for the conditioning of society to falter, if only for a moment. ... . The story of Jekyll and Hyde is an analysis of these urges, this nature, made corporeal against the nurture of society.…
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Dr. Jekyll was a very kind and friendly man, unsuspected to be the cause of any evil. However Dr. Jekyll had a dark side bottled up inside him. He succeeded in devising a solution to separate his dark side from his light side. His potion turned Dr. Jekyll into a purely evil character Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll turned back into his good side by drinking the solution again. Only there was a problem. Dr. Jekyll enjoyed letting out his evil side so he could be wicked. Therefore he began to let Hyde out more often. To Dr. Jekyll this seemed fun and jocund, until his dark side began doing more and more violent acts. Mr. Hyde started to get out control. Mr. Hyde was dominating Jekyll. The death of Henry Jekyll came to be when Hyde came into control permanently.…
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Next among the three parts of Freud’s psychic apparatus is “ego”. “Ego” is applied to the organized and realistic part of a character’s mentality and, unlike the “id”, requires judgment and next-level thinking. Victor Frankenstein’s willing development into a scientifically learned being and then his venture into creating life from inanimate body parts accurately shows the more advanced, yet still somewhat surface, thought process of an “ego”-influenced being. Additionally,…
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This theme of duality, and how Robert Louis Stevenson portrays it to us, is very much an embodiment of Freudian concepts. The issues raised in the novel find resonance with the Freudian concepts of instincts, life and death instincts, and the structural theory of the mind. The characters in the novel manifest characteristics of Freud’s theory of the mind. Mr. Hyde would seem easily recognizable as the id, seeking instant gratification, having an aggressive instinct, and having no moral or social mores that need be followed. He takes pleasure in violence and similar to the death instinct ultimately leads to his own destruction. Dr. Jekyll is then the ego; he is conscious and rational, and is dominated by social principles. He has a difficult time juggling between the demands of the id, represented…
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Dr. Jekyll is a well-respected man in his community but he allows pride to be his downfall in the novel (69). Instead of seeking help and accountability through close friends, he hides his secret transformations as if he is ashamed of his experiment (64). While Mr. Utterson and others were weary of his experiment, he pressed on in the research as he was much too proud of his work to quit (11). A while later during his experiment, Dr. Jekyll allows himself to think about how much better of a person he is compared to Mr. Hyde, which acts as a catalyst to transform Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde without the consumption of the potion (78). It was not the potion that destroyed Dr. Hyde physically and mentally as well as decided his fate, but rather his pride. For even he “had grown pale; his flesh had fallen away; he was visibly balder and older (35).”…
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The story of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was written in the 19th century. This was a time when scientific advances were rapid and new discoveries taking place within a short space of time. This is also known as the post Darwinian Period. At the time people where still recovering from the previously published book by Darwin, ‘’Origin of Species’’. This basically depicted us as being descended from apes and being just the product of evolution, which contradicted all religious texts and beliefs. However, towards the end of the 19th century, within the post-Darwinian perspective, scientists such as Freud were also beginning to examine various influences on human morality and character including drug and alcohol addiction, multiple personality disorder, and regressive animality. These are questionable influences in the novella written by Stevenson and possible drives behind the writing.…
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Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a gripping struggle between human nature and a man’s will to tamper with it. The book was written in late nineteenth-century England, just after a time known as the enlightenment, where scientific boundaries were pushed and natural law was questioned. Stevenson’s novella is a prime example of the times, as Dr. Jekyll continually seeks a scientific solution to a natural problem. The problem is social confinements, and the solution seems as simple as a concoction to Jekyll. Yet Jekyll learns that there is no solution, for his predicament is an inherent part of man. As Jekyll slowly becomes destroyed by his alter-ego, Mr. Hyde, one questions who or what is to blame for his defeat, and whether Jekyll is really good or evil. In all, it is because of Jekyll, and his attempts to toy with his own identity that he discovers the duality of human nature, resulting in his downfall.…
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