The main theme in Jekyll and Hyde is that of the dual nature of humanity, and it’s
a theme we see everywhere in the text. In A Chapter on Dreams (1892), Robert Louis
Stevenson explained how he had ‘long been trying to write a story on this subject, to
find a body, a vehicle, for that strong sense of man's double being which must at times
come in upon and overwhelm the mind of every thinking creature’. As Stevenson developed
as a writer, he continually returned to the idea that a human is not simply one but consists
of multiple personalities or mindsets that constantly battle with each other. Stevenson
wrote letters to friends about his childhood spent ill in bed, suffering from dangerous
fevers. It was at this time, he says, that he really became aware of another ‘person’,
another consciousness within him. He called the two ‘myself and the other fellow’.
The other fellow, he said, was careless, reckless and irrational. Here, of course, we can draw
parallels with the two characters Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
Now of course the theme of duality is presented is in the plot itself, with the two characters
of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde found to be one and the same person. Today, even a first- time
reader is likely to know about this plot twist but, at the time the novella was written,
we must not underestimate the shock that this revelation created. Jekyll refers to ‘man's
dual nature’ in chapter ten, explaining how ‘all human beings...are commingled out
of good and evil’. However, rather than simply analyse the plot itself, you may also
like to analyse how Stevenson presents the theme of duality through his use of genre,
setting and language. As explained in ‘Popular Fiction and Brain
Science in the Late Nineteenth Century’ by Anne Stiles, the novella conforms to the
dual, opposing genres of gothic fiction and scientific journal. It is gothic in its use
of monsters, horror, death, night-time settings, ominous weather and inexplicable events. However,
the text mirrors a scientific journal in the way in which the first eight chapters employ
a seemingly dispassionate third-person narrative voice. The concrete, supplementary evidence
presented at the end (the letters from Lanyon and Jekyll) mirrors the supplementary additions
of information placed at the end of a scientific case study. The key point is that these two
genres are opposed to each other. The gothic aims to create fear and mystery whilst the
scientific journal aims to offer a rational explanation. Through conforming to the generic
expectations of two seemingly opposing genres, Stevenson presents his theme on the duality
of humans, and the opposition of the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ sides within all.
Stevenson’s choice to set the novella in London can also be seen to represent the theme
of duality. The 1800s in Britain was a time of great change.
One of the most challenging things for the established upper classes in Victorian society
was the influx of people viewed as working class or lower class into the big cities of
Britain. They were coming in search of work and housing, but the cities of the time, especially
London, were quite unprepared for them. The sudden increase in numbers made the upper
classes nervous. They were clearly outnumbered, and they began to create areas of these cities
where they would not go and other areas where they would socialise. This division of the
cities into ‘no-go areas’ was interesting because it created an ‘other’ in London
specifically. Rich people tended to live in the west, and stories of debauchery and crime
in places like the East End and Soho (where Hyde has his lodgings) were both shocking
and fascinating to them. London, it can be said, had a dual personality of two opposing
sides—a key theme in this novella. As well as the general setting of London,
many of the specific settings in the novella contain contrast, again to symbolise the contrasting
natures of Jekyll and Hyde. A number of examples of this are explained in detail in the chapter
on setting. Here, we will focus on just one such example.
In the opening chapter of the novella, we read a positive description of a street which
‘with its freshly painted shutters, well-polished brasses, and general cleanliness and gaiety
of note, instantly caught and pleased the eye of the passenger’. The tone then shifts
as we read about Jekyll’s laboratory door: ‘Two doors from one corner, on the left
hand going east, the line was broken by the entry of a court; and just at that point,
a certain sinister block of building thrust forward its gable in the street.’ This contrast
of setting, from positive to negative, is a technique we find throughout the text. Once
again, it is used to symbolise the contrasting opposition found in the duality of humanity.
On a number of occasions, Stevenson’s use of language contains contrast. Perhaps the
most notable example is found when Enfield describes how Hyde ‘trampled calmly’ over
the young girl in the novella’s opening chapter. This quotation is an example of an
oxymoron: a figure of speech using seemingly contradictory words. The word ‘trampled’,
with its connotations of rough and careless action, are opposed to the connotations of
the adverb ‘calmly’. This opposition of language again reflects the opposition of
nature found in the characters of Jekyll and Hyde, and also in Stevenson’s beliefs about
the dual nature of humans.