KEY IDEAS AND ANALYSIS

  1. Duality is inherent and irrepressible.

Inherent - within us

Irrepressible - cannot be gotten rid of

  • Humans are born with innate duality. Stevenson shows through the novella to his readership that the idea of the Victorian society putting pressure on individuals to put on a facade and play the part of the ‘gentleman’ is futile, because no matter how much we try to conceal it, it will not eradicate our true dual nature.

  1. The duality in Jekyll is a microcosm for Victorian society.

Microcosm - something small representing something larger

  • Jekyll possessing this duality whilst simultaneously being a microcosm for Victorian society illustrates that the duality permeates throughout the entirety of society. No matter the standard of the Victorian gentleman, everyone possesses it.

Stevenson, throughout the novella, is showing the readership the irony of the obsession which the Victorian era had with propriety and social order despite having a dark undertone of poverty, crime and unrest.

  1. Duality is caused because of a battle of societies wants and the instincts of man.

Links to Freud’s psychoanalytic theory - the ID, the ego and the superego

ID: animalistic part of man

EGO: to balance the ID’s and superego’s wants

SUPER EGO: to conform the society standards

  • Jekyll’s dual nature is caused by the conflict between Hyde (the ID of Jekyll), and Jekyll’s superego of wanting to conform to the propriety and expectations of Victorian society. Hyde has beastly wants whereas Jekyll understands stringent social expectations and conforms to them.