The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Plot Summary
The novel takes place in late nineteenth-century England. Lawyer Gabriel Utterson and his “man about town,” cousin Richard Enfield, are taking their customary Sunday walk when they approach a building that is familiar to Enfield. He explains that near this building he recently witnessed the brutal, heedless trampling of a small child by a man named Hyde. Utterson is interested in the story because the will of his friend Dr. Henry Jekyll specifies that Jekyll’s entire fortune should go upon his death to an Edward Hyde. Jekyll will not explain who Hyde is or why he wishes to leave his fortune to him, and Utterson suspects that his friend is being blackmailed. About a year later Hyde is sought by the police for the murder of a kindly old man, a well-known member of Parliament named Sir Danvers Carew. Jekyll produces a letter from Hyde promising to disappear forever and apologizes for having compromised his friend. Around the same time a former friend of Jekyll’sand his fellow physicianDr. Hastie Lanyon, becomes ill and dies. Among his papers is a letter addressed to Utterson; inside is a sealed envelope with the instruction that it must not be opened until after the death of Jekyll.
Utterson is summoned to Jekyll’s residence by his friend’s servant, Poole, who reports that his master has been confined in his laboratory for a week and has sent Poole on several searches for a particular drug. Poole fears that Jekyll has been killed and that his murderer has remained in the laboratory, impersonating his victim. After a voice that sounds like Hyde’s begs them to go away, Utterson and Poole break into the lab and discover Hyde’s body; he has killed himself by drinking poison. Jekyll is nowhere in sight. When Utterson finally reads the letters left by Lanyon and Jekyll, he learns the secret of Jekyll and Hyde. Lanyon’s letter explains that Hyde had come to his laboratory to retrieve some drugs previously requested by Jekyll. In Lanyon’s presence Hyde ingested the drugs and was transformed into Jekyll. Lanyon was so shocked and aggrieved by this experience that he grew ill and died. Jekyll’s letter provides a full account of his activities, explaining how he began as a younger man to lead a double life. Morally upright and respectable in public, he indulged in a variety of vices in private, and as a result he became obsessed with the idea of dual personality. Surmising that it might be possible to isolate a man’s good and evil natures into two separate beings, he experimented with drugs until he was able to produce Hyde, the physical manifestation of his own wickedness. Hyde was then free to indulge in immoral practices without fear of discovery, while Jekyll would supposedly lead a spotless life of good. Gradually, however, Hyde became more dominant and seemed to be gaining control over Jekyll. After a long period of suppression, Jekyll allowed Hyde to emerge again, and the result had been the murder of Carew. Unable to rid himself of his evil counterpart through experimental drug ingestions, the despairing Jekyll/Hyde finally killed himself.
Blog Twenty-one -150 word blog – The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has been analyzed and dissected for the hundred plus years that it has been around. It has also made its way into out pop culture in the form of superheroes with dual-sided identities (think Batman and the Incredible Hulk) along with comedies that take a not-so-funny look at the struggles most of us face with our own dualities. What do you think makes this story so everlasting? How might the themes relate to us like they related to the Victorians? What struggles are part of human nature that Stevenson explores?
