“When this shall fall into your hands, I shall have disappeared, under what circumstances, I have not the penetration to foresee; but my instincts and all the circumstances of my nameless situation tell me that the end is sure and must be early...,”
So wrote Dr. Henry Jekyll to his friend and lawyer Mr. Utterson. Dr. Jekyll is a respected and pretty well liked member of society. Mr. Hyde is a shady character whose visage sparks disgust and terror into the hearts of any who are unfortunate enough to witness it. These two, though two completely different humans, are actually one human and must share the same body. Utterson realizes, after the situation is made perfectly clear to him, that to discover and utilize the remedy to this is extremely important. Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde tantalized me with a captivating tale of mystery and suspense.
One of the most significant problems humanity faces is addressed in this tale: the ability to balance a life between good and evil (this is, of course, only an issue to the “majority” of people). Jekyll lives a righteous life, meaning problems are rare for him, and are even nonexistent, other than the desire he has to release his darker side. Rather than to commit misdeeds occasionally, Jekyll uses his science, he is a doctor after all, to construct a solution that grants him his wish. Edward Hyde overthrows Jekyll for control of the body and runs rampant. Because Jekyll could not find a healthy medium, adopting neutrality as his manner and not good, his need to transform consumed him and drove both Hyde and the doctor to their death(s).
The way in which Stevenson wrote this book appeals to readers that possess an extended vocabulary of and who know a considerable amount of “Old English” terms; that is to say that if your lexicon is only filled with modern English, this story is, for the most part, un-understandable. Extended sentences that may last for a whole paragraph occur often and incite annoyance, making it hard for any impatient, uneducated (of the old forms of English) potential readers to read this. If these two proposed “problems” are, in fact, NOT problems, by all means, read this. Other than those two obstacles, the finish line that is the end of the tale is easily obtainable.
Intelligence and patience are ideal to the complete understanding of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but persistence would allow anyone to be able to read this classic; and anyone who does finish this composition will more than likely have enjoyed the time spent reading it.
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