JEKYLL AND HYDE CONTEXT Flashcards
Stevenson was influenced by… (hyde)
darwins theory of evolution (1859) which challenged the traditional Christian ideas that man was made in Gods image, and was instead evolved from apes. He played on this Victorian social anxiety that heir relationship with God was being challenged through the characterisation of hyde as the beast within
arguably hyde… (hydes evil)
reflects the devil inside all mankind and is an illusion to original sin. The infernal imagery used to describe Hyde presents him as a satanic figure struggling with the more godly spark within man
Stevenson seems to pre-empt (duality)
Freuds idea of the split in human consciousness between the id and the ego, with hyde representing the animalistic id and Jekyll the more rational civilised ego
in Victorian times , (Victorian gentleman)
a Victorian gentleman was supposed to be a well mannered respectable Christian man who was better than the lower classes. It was a highly repressed moralistic culture that contrasted with the vice present in London at the time,
Stevenson is critiquing the hypocrisy of a society which is full of contradictions
Stevensons text is an example of ….
gothic fiction, a genre of writing which was popular in the nineteenth century. However, unlike monsters such as Frankenstein and Dracula his was a tale about the monster within not the monster without
Stevenson is commenting on ….
the way that poverty crime and wealth co existed on Victorian England. Victorian London was rife with prostitution gambling houses and pubs . it was also a heavily unequal in terms of wealth
Stevenson was influenced by the real life double of life
deacon brodie who was a cabinet maker in Edinburgh, a century before the novella was written. Brodie lived a double life as a thief to fund his vice of gambling and prostitution despite being a ‘respectable member of society’. Stevenson even wrote an unsuccessful play about him and remained fascinated by the dichotomy within the man
