"Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde"

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses how "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde" has often been read as a novel on the duality of character and how, to a large extent, this kind of interpretation was extended to the readers by Jekyll's own admission that his life could be studied as one "committed to a profound duplicity". The writer proposes that closer reading of the novel reveals that Jekyll's personality disorder was caused by severe dependency on a drug. The writer argues that this heavy consumption of some psychoactive substance results in duplicity of personality which closely resembled the author's own life. The paper concludes that the "Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" was not a simplistic study of good and evil but instead of one man's heavy dependence on chemicals, which caused a psychotic disorder.

From the Paper:

"We cannot say that Jekyll was doing all this because his mind of incapable of seeing what was morally correct because he himself calls Hyde an epitome of "pure evil" (p. 128) and calls him "[t]hat child of Hell" (p. 150). But it was addiction that had sapped his will power and thus he couldn't let go of the monster. It is important to understand that Jekyll like other drug addicts is not fond of the drug itself but the state that it induces. I mentioned this earlier and it is worth repeating to prove his addiction. Jekyll liked being in that liberating state of being completely evil as he said once: "I knew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be more wicked, tenfold more wicked, sold a slave to my original evil; and the thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like wine" (p. 126)."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Robert Louis Stevenson. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska, 1990)
• Philip R. Kavanaugh, Magnificent Addiction: Discovering Addiction Healing (Lower Lake, CA: Aslan, 1992), p. 9.
• "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," Vladimir Nabokov: Lectures on Literature, ed. Fredson Bowers (New York: Harvest/HBJ, 1980).
• Richard T. Gaughan, "Mr. Hyde and Mr. Seek: Utterson's Antidote," Journal of Narrative Technique 17 (Spring 1987): 184.
• Irving S. Saposnik, Robert Louis Stevenson (Boston: Twayne, 1974), p. 88.

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• Persuasive Essay # 120754 : "Homosexuality in "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"
• Book Review # 29610 : "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"
• Analytical Essay # 54159 : "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"

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