Courtney Davidson Character Analysis

In the novel, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde says, “Hence it came about that I concealed my pleasures; and that when I reached years of reflection, and began to look around me and take stock of my progress and position in the world, I stood already committed to a profound duplicity of me” (Stevenson 864). The two personalities of Dr. Jekyll are but one; same person but with different characters that are conflicting with each other. The good, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the evil one can be represented as the id and superego based on the theory of Sigmund Freud. Dr. Jekyll behaves through his superego meaning he acts according to the standards of the society; meanwhile, Mr. Hyde represents the id, which does anything he wants without consideration for the reality of the society. In general, Dr. Jekyll can be himself when he is as Mr. Hyde.

The story of Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde is a prime example of good versus evil as a man struggles with an experience that goes bad. Dr. Henry Jekyll is a man of science and he develops a potions that causes him to have two separate and distinct personalities. As time passes, Dr. Jekyll discovers that he is losing his ability to control the sinister side of his personality, Mr. Hyde. The effects of this scientific experiments will dramatically change his life and the lives of his friends.

This shows both good and evil in Henry Jekyll, he is good in the sense that he wouldn’t put his profession to shame yet evil as although it is Edward Hyde who indulges in his pleasures, it is still Dr. Jekyll’s soul who is directing these actions. In the novel, although Dr. Jekyll does represent good he is not to represent only good but also evil.

Despite saying this Jekyll still succumbs to his Id and Hyde is drawn out again. Jekyll knows of the evil that comes out when he transforms into Hyde. Jekyll says “This, as I take it, was because all human beings, as we meet them are commingled out of good and evil: and Edward Hyde alone in the ranks of mankind, was pure evil”(Stevenson 108). Here Jekyll clearly states that he knows Hyde is evil yet he still cannot overpower his Id and then his Superego is overcome. By turning into Hyde, Jekyll feels free and can do whatever he wants without the slightest hesitation. Following his innate desires Hyde murders Sir Danvers Carew and tramples a young girl. These actions are done through the Id and even though Jekyll is civilized law abiding man once the Id has taken over and he transforms into Hyde, his dark side is unleashed. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are but one; one body but two conflicting characters, the good and evil.

To begin with, Jekyll, in Stevenson’s book, lives behind a disguise for years trying to embrace his civilized-self and ignore his savage urges. The fear of his mask falling off at any moment pushes Jekyll to create Hyde as his only solution towards a sense of liberation. In Jekyll’s mind his identity is being ripped apart constantly making him and his alter ego, Hyde, perfect specimens, “of a double consciousness, of a ‘divided self’” (Letley 10). In his statement about the case, Jekyll declares

The theme of the existence of good and evil in every human being is prevalent throughout the story. Stevenson highlights this idea by describing Jekyll and Hyde’s disparity in terms of action and personality. Dr. Jekyll, unbeknownst of Utterson, had created a potion that gave him the power to split his good and evil self into two separate beings. However, it only created Hyde, the evil of the two without the creation of the good, angelic being. With the eventual discovery of this, Utterson was clarified of the plethora of mysteries that encumbered him.

Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a classic tale that emulates a human’s struggle with identity and the forces that govern it. Jekyll is overcome by societal pressures including society itself, personal wants, and strength of will; unable to resist temptation, he finds himself pushed into the arms of his alternate personality: Mr. Hyde. Bogged down by behavioral regulations imposed on him by his predecessors, Jekyll created Hyde as a way to express eccentricities labelled taboo by the harsh ideals of Victorian society. From childhood, Jekyll spiraled into a habit of confining himself, only revealing his conventional identity to the public, and hiding the darkness and morbidity that lay dormant in his

In “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” Dr. Jekyll has become lost with his inner self. He has led himself to believe that the man that he is is not the man that he wishes to be. Dr. Jekyll is now seeing himself as a man of evil, a man that people should consider dangerous. Not the man he is now, a gentle, higher class man that people enjoy to spend time with and one who people respect.

Good and evil and not one but two, they are separate from each other but consisted in one body. Dr. Jekyll conflicts with the duality of human nature. Jekyll reveals that he struggles with letting the evil inside him to escape. Even though Dr. Jekyll is a well respected, good man, he allows the evil in him to go wild, such as Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde is a man looked down on, a man of sinful actions who is pure evil. When, Hyde starts to control Jekyll, Jekyll realizes what it finally means to have evil take over good.

He believes that humans have both good and bad side. He creates a serum for a drug that he uses to separate the two different sides. Henry test it on himself and the experiment horribly fails. Dr. Jekyll changes Mr. Edward Hyde the evil part of himself. Hyde commits horrible crimes in London, while Dr. Jekyll sleeps. Dr. Jekyll wants to fix his past and present by getting rid of the evil that’s inside him just like Phillip Vanderdecken Sr (Davie Jones).

By experimenting, he is able to free the evil in him and giving it a life without caring about the needs from his other side. As Dr. Jekyll says, “With every day and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and intellectual, I thus drew steadily to that truth by whose partial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two." Stevenson creates in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, two opposed components that make up a “normal” individual. Good and evil are no longer related and become two independent identities, They are different in mental and physical composition, and they stay constantly at war with each other. Hyde's evil now is now independent and no longer requires good to justify his actions.

Jekyll not only did an experiment to split his two personalities, but was willing to risk everything to do it. He was willing to risk his reputation, friends, and his life. Dr. Jekyll’s evil persona, even went as far as killing someone. This is what Dr. Jekyll said about Edward Hyde “long as I had considered my position, made enough allowance for the complete moral insensibility and insensate readiness to evil, which were the leading characters of Edward Hyde. Yet it was by these that I was punished.

Dr. Jekyll is mostly respected, He struggles between his good and bad side so he tried to separate his good and his bad side and by conducting these experiments he becomes he bad side which is named Mr. Hyde, Mr. Hyde is not a real person he is just Dr Jekyll’s bad personality which he turns into through the course of his experiments.

Jekyll imagines that the human soul is a battleground with an angel, and a fiend each struggling for mastery but one will always dominate. The inner conflict begins with Dr. Jekyll’s experiment to divide evil and virtue, the two provinces [...] that compound man’s dual nature . Dr. Jekyll claims that one day “man will be ultimately known for a mere polity of multifarious, incongruous and independent denizens” . He hoped to separate and purify each element, however, he succeeded in bringing only the evil side into being. Although there were now two physical identities, one was purely evil; the other was still the old Henry Jekyll. He refers to Mr. Hyde using the pronoun “He”, and applies it when he talks about himself. The body becomes the signifier of evil or

Hyde. In this way, Jekyll becomes monstrous himself as he wishes to pass on his evil parts into another person. Jekyll’s concoction is a threat to cultural morals and values as it enables someone to set evil free. Consequently, there is no obligation and interest in adhering to any moral standards. In the end, he is a split person, one-half is represented by Jekyll and the other one by Hyde. Stevenson used the different standpoints in the story to create the feeling that Jekyll and Hyde are two different individuals: “‘The Master Hyde, if he were studied,’ thought he [Utterson],’must have secrets of his own; black secrets, by the look of him; secrets compared to which poor Jekyll’s worst would be like sunshine.” (Stevenson 22). Thus, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a story where the line blurs. As Hyde and Jekyll are one and the same person, the reader realises that they together are both moral and immoral and both good and