The Notion of Good and Evil in Stevensons Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde Essay

The Notion of Good and Evil in Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde The book entitled 'The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' was published in 1886. Although in the book Stevenson does not ever state the exact year, it was at the time recognized immediately as a grand work. The main theme running throughout the book is about the duality of human beings and the battle in all humans between good and evil. This book is very allegorical because the characters and events are representing other things and symbolically expressing a deeper spiritual and moral meaning. For humans the battle between the potential for extreme good and extreme evil is in the mind, but Jekyll's experiment has given one man a split personality of the two extremes in the physical realm. The book also involves a theme of hypocrisy, as shown by Jekyll and Hyde of Victorian society. On one hand it was pleasant society, respectable, conventional, deeply religious, and polite. On the other was a much more bohemian England, symbolized by dishonesty and darkness. The combination of the two aspects in contrast to each other made an impression on Stevenson. This was a world of appearance not truth with Victorian oppression, fighting against basic human nature. Throughout the story is an omniscient narrator who tells the story from full view of different people with different perspectives (e.g. the view of the maid lets us into her feelings and attitudes towards Hyde). The author could have chosen another route by possibly telling the story as a confession from Jekyll's point of view. The author chose not to write in this way because he wanted to give a view of... ...This is a warning from Stevenson to the reader not to take the easy way out. It also proves that Stevenson wants the reader to judge Jekyll harshly as he was weak and took the "cowards" path out, which lead to his death. Although Jekyll seems to have no control over Hyde, once he has transformed, it is Jekyll's original attitude towards evil in the first place, which brings him trouble. He sees the ability to lose moral control and be free from the ties of society as a kind of liberation, which is why the transformation into Mr Hyde is so appealing to him. It is not that he has no regard to society as a whole, or he wouldn't need to turn into Hyde, but that he cannot tolerate that certain behaviour is prohibited. By becoming Hyde, Jekyll can follow his wildest imaginations without worrying about the consequences.