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The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

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A London lawyer wonders why his respectable friend Dr. Jekyll has left everything to a vicious little man called Edward Hyde. By Robert Louis Stevenson (1886). A public-domain classic.

Content warnings: Violence · Death

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How it begins Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance that was never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary and yet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye; something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly in the acts of his life. He was austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for vintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the doors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined to help rather than to reprove. “I incline to Cain’s heresy,” he used to say quaintly: “I let my brother go to the devil in his own way.” In this character, it was frequently his fortune to be the last reputable acquaintance and the last good influence in the lives of downgoing men. And to such as these, so long as they came about his chambers, he never marked a shade of change in his demeanour.No doubt the feat was easy to Mr. Utterson; for he was undemonstrative at the best, and even his friendship seemed to be founded in a similar catholicity of good-nature. It is the mark of a modest man to accept his friendly circle ready-made from the hands of opportunity; and that was the lawyer’s way. His friends were those of his own blood or those whom he had known the longest; his affections, like ivy, were the growth of time, they implied no aptness in the object. Hence, no doubt the bond that united him to Mr. Richard Enfield, his distant kinsman, the well-known man about town. It was a nut to crack for many, what these two could see in each other, or what subject they could find in common. It was reported by those who encountered them in their Sunday walks, that they said nothing, looked singularly dull and would hail with obvious relief the appearance of a friend. For all that, the two men put the greatest store by these excursions, counted them the chief jewel of each week, and not only set aside occasions of pleasure, but even resisted the calls of business, that they might enjoy them uninterrupted. Keep reading →

About this story

Mr Utterson, a London lawyer, hears a story about a vicious man named Hyde who trampled a child in the street and then paid the family off with a cheque signed by his own friend, the respectable Dr Jekyll. Utterson, who cannot see why the two would be connected, starts to investigate.

Robert Louis Stevenson published it in 1886. He said the central idea came to him in a dream, and wrote the first draft in a few days. It was an immediate success, and “Jekyll and Hyde” has since become a phrase for anyone with two sides to their character. The story is told mostly from the outside, through the eyes of Utterson, so the mystery builds slowly.

Themes: Good and evil in one person, respectability, secrets, science
Good for: Readers who like Victorian mysteries; a short, tense novel to read in one sitting
Worth noticing: How little we see of Jekyll himself until near the end.

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