Dr Jekyll Flashcards
“A fortnight later, by excellent good fortune, the doctor gave one of his pleasant dinners to some five or six old cronies, all intelligent, reputable men and all judges of good wine”
Jekyll is sociable, well respected and well liked: behaving in a socially acceptable way. He is described elsewhere as a “charitable man” who carries “his head high” in public and social matters, putting on “a more commonly grave countenance before the public”.
“Hence it came about that I concealed my pleasures; and that when I reached years of reflection, and began to look round me and take stock of my progress and position in the world, I stood already committed to a profound duplicity of me”
Dr Jekyll, abiding to the status quo of the time, “concealed his pleasures” and suppressed his sinful side in favour of social respect and withholding his “position in the world”.
“He came out of his seclusion, renewed relations with his friends, became once more their familiar guest and entertainer; and whilst he had always been known for charities, he was now no less distinguished for religion”
Jekyll attempts to re-assimilate into society after indulging in Hyde and feeling a “morbid sense of shame”.
“My devil had long been caged, he came out roaring. I was conscious, even when I took the draught, of a more unbridled, a more furious propensity to ill”
This quote references the inner“devil”,which is a manifestation of Jekyll’s deepest desires in the form of Hyde. The notion of “devil” through religious allusion denotes a stark contrast with Christian ideas of morality. Furthermore, the verb “roaring” has connotations of an animalistic, uncontrolled, agitated and deadly expression of his repressed elements in Hyde, and the phrase “Propensity to ill” indicates a deeper, now natural tendency and inclination to immorality.
“I looked down; my clothes hung formlessly on my shrunken limbs; the hand that lay on my knee was corded and hairy”
Here, the hand, a symbol of respectability and honour, is invaded by free flowing hair, insuitating ideas of uncontrolled freedom.
“There was something strange in my sensations, something indescribably new and, from its very novelty, incredibly sweet. I felt younger, lighter, happier in body, within I was conscious of a heady recklessness… a current of disordered sensual images… a solution of the bonds of obligation”
This suggests the restraints of society are burdensome: without them, he, or more specifically Hyde, is able to indulge freely. The tricolon structure (“younger, lighter, happier”) shows Jekyll’s delight. This links to his moral obligations, which are worn away by his chemical mixture as he is no longer constrained by the maintenance of reputation when in a different body.
“For any drug that so potently controlled and shook the very fortress of identity, might, by the least scruple of an overdose… utterly blot out that immaterial tabernacle which I looked to change.”
The phrase “Immaterial tabernacle” has religious undertones; Jekyll’s practices in “drugs”, shaking the “fortress of identity” encroaches on God’s territory.
“Both sides of me were in dead earnest; I was no more myself when I laid aside restraint and plunged in shame, than when I laboured, in the eye of day, at the furtherance of knowledge or the relief of sorrow and suffering”
This shows Dr Jekyll has failed in splitting the good and the bad - rather he has enabled the evil to thrive and to subsume his underlying purity and innocence; he can no longer return to society.
“Man is not truly one but truly two”
Jekyll risks death to test his hypothesis that the human psyche can be split, and the quote’s syntactic parallelism emphasises the view that man cannot be pure as he is constantly in equilibrium between good and evil.
“I was driven to reflect deeply and inveterately on that hard law of life which lies at the root of religion and one of the most plentiful springs of distress”
Stevenson uses alliteration in “law of life” and “root of religion”. This refers to conscience and guilt. By separating his moral and immoral sides, Jekyll attempts to avoid guilt.
“I have been made to learn that the doom and burthen of our life is bound for ever on man’s shoulders and when the attempt is made to cast it off, it but returns upon us with more unfamiliar and more awful pressure”
The phrase “Doom and burthen of our life” relates to attempting to balance good and evil; when one tries to isolate and exploit the individual aspects of good and evil, they unite with greater force.
“Late one accursed night, I compounded the elements, watched them boil…with a strong glow of courage, drank off the potion”
The phrase “Late one accursed night” uses the motif of darkness. Stevenson also uses lexis from the semantic field of chemistry in “I compounded the elements”, and in “Strong glow of courage” suggests the erratic manner of Jekyll’s personality and behaviour, and also shows he understood the risks he was taking when deciding to take the potion.
“Had I approached my discovery in a more noble spirit, had I risked the experiment while under the empire of generous or pious aspirations…and from these agonies of death and birth, I had come forth an angel instead of a fiend”
Here, “Noble spirit” and “empire of generous or pious aspirations” highlight notion of Jekyll being in accordance with scientific and moral protocol. Inverse iconic word order is used in “death and birth”, highlighting the fact that Jekyll’s desire to isolate moral and immoral goes above and beyond the restrictions of generations.
“gaiety of disposition”
Before Hyde, Jekyll felt he had a “gaiety of disposition”- he felt he was always happy, but significantly he felt he needed to hide this happiness and true nature as his happiness didn’t align with the image of a respectable gentleman.
“A profound duplicity of life”
This is Stevenson’s method of criticising the 19th century Victorian society, which forces gentleman into being dishonest- pretending to be one thing on the surface, having a facade, whereas being something completely different underneath.
