Playing With Ironies

When reading a masterful classic such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, it is easy for the reader to become so immersed in the compelling supernatural mystery consuming the principle characters, that the detailed descriptions Stevenson provides for the locations of the main dramatic action might summarily be regarded as being of minimal importance. However, these settings not only provide a glimpse into the heart of the repressive Victorian society, but also serve to augment the evil foreboding of Stevenson’s Gothic allegory and symbolize Jekyll’s moral and rational dichotomy. Written in the Gothic genre, Stevenson utilizes the settings for his novella to parallel the psychological and supernatural themes of his work. Each prudently crafted setting—the bustling city of London, the fog-enshrouded lamp-lit bystreets, Dr. Jekyll’s affluently appointed residence, and his disheveled and derelict scientific laboratory—become metaphors that underscore Stevenson’s themes of the duality of human nature and man’s internal struggle between good and evil.
Stevenson’s initial introduction to Jekyll is through the descriptions of his townhouse, which not only provide insight into the privileged lifestyle of Victorian aristocracy, but into the social mores and principles that govern the behavior of respectable society. Dr. Jekyll, a wealthy bachelor, is well respected by his community and his socialite acquaintances. Consequently, his impeccable residence appears to be of discriminating taste and refined decorum, for even the doorway is ascribed to bearing “a great air of wealth and comfort” (14). Upon one particular visit to Jekyll’s home, Utterson, Jekyll’s solicitor and friend, is shown into the fashionable reception hall, which apparently he is wont to call “the pleasantest room in London,” a generous compliment from a man of Utterson’s urbane refinement (14). As it appears from the façade of the residence, nothing is out of the ordinary, and Jekyll’s sophisticated home testifies to the mannered, ordered, and rational existence that he leads; a life governed by the protocol of Victorian morality and propriety. However, as the narrative progresses, the reader discovers the ominous secret that masquerades behind the urbane façade of Jekyll’s stately and idyllic home. As Dr. Jekyll becomes eclipsed by the depraved Hyde, his house slowly reflects the transformation. Utterson notes the once elegant and welcoming door “was now plunged in darkness except for the fan-light,” and that the fire which once seemed to glow with warmth and hospitality, “he seemed to read a menace in the flickering of the firelight on the polished cabinets and the uneasy starting of the shadow on the roof” (14). The townhouse, which initially possesses an air of tranquility, reflects the malevolent changes to Jekyll’s own soul. Stevenson proves that, similarly to Jekyll, the “false face [of the house] must hide what the false heart doth know” (Macbeth, Act 1, Scene 7). This malignancy cannot be controlled, and just as Dr. Jekyll is unable to conceal the evil lurking within himself, the townhouse reflects the turpitude embodied within.
In contrast to the splendor of upper class aristocracy, the social turmoil in Victorian England provides further insight into the major themes concerning Jekyll’s metaphysical transformation. Immigration and the rise of Industrialism during this period had exponentially increased the population of large cities. This resulted in a proportionate rise in the rate of poverty, violent crime, and prostitution. Stevenson utilizes this social degeneracy to create a perfect environment for the murderous Hyde. During the daylight hours, London was presided over by the upper class civility, most of whom conducted their affairs largely indifferent of the social and economic decay surrounding them. However, once the night was ushered in, the squalid and criminal underbelly of the London was exposed. It was no longer a city governed by societal conventions, but a city where immorality lurked within each shadow, and where one “begins to long for the sight of a policeman” (5). Despite being a man of distinction and rationality, when Mr. Utterson, Jekyll’s solicitor, travels to Hyde’s residence, he apprehensively watches as “the fog lifted a little and showed him a dingy street, a gin palace […] many ragged children huddled in the doorway […] and the next moment the fog settled down again […] and cut him off from his blackguardly surroundings” (20). Stevenson utilizes this nightmarish description of the urban landscape not only to heighten the mystery and suspense of the story, but also highlight and underscore the nefarious and animalistic nature of Mr. Hyde. One cannot imagine the novel’s villain prowling through London during the broad daylight hours, unnoticed and un-accosted, while he perpetrates his horrific malefactions. However, under the cover of night, with only the street lamps, “kindled afresh to combat this mournful reinvasion of darkness,” to witness his deeds, Hyde, and ultimately Stevenson, uses the anonymous darkness to his advantage (20). Amidst these sinister environs, one witnesses a breakdown of rational and civilized behavior that perfectly parallels the immoral primitive desires of Hyde, making London’s nightscape the ideal setting for his unrestrained wickedness.
The main theme of the tale explores the moral duality of man’s human nature, and Stevenson so perfectly realizes this dilemma when he provides the reader with a description of Jekyll’s scientific laboratory. In contrast to the restrained and meticulous civility evident in his Victorian household, Jekyll’s laboratory is in a state of utter chaos, “lying gaunt and silent, the tables laden with chemical apparatus, the floor strewn with crates and littered with packing straw, and the light falling dimly through the foggy cupola” (22). As the learned doctor of sciences, Jekyll is a pillar of society whose abode demonstrates taste and codification, and as the transformed Hyde, his life is a tumultuous whirlwind of evil and malicious passions, the personification of the animalistic and the troglodyte, void of the moral constraints governing Victorian society. Additionally, when Utterson is first ushered into the cluttered laboratory, he notices “three dusty windows barred with iron” (22). Although one may argue that the bars serve the functional purpose of protecting his laboratory from intruders, it may be equally as valid to argue that the steel bars reminds the reader that Jekyll is imprisoned by his failed experiment and by the Pandora’s box of evil embodied by Hyde. And then there is the door. In the bystreet there is the infamous door that leads out from Jekyll’s laboratory, but from which Hyde is sole creature to issue forth. Unlike the door to the townhouse that bears “a great air of wealth and comfort,” this secret backdoor to Jekyll’s laboratory is an entrance to pure evil and “bore in every feature, the marks of prolonged and sordid negligence” (14, 4). These entrances reflect each side of Jekyll’s personality; the proper townhouse conceals Jekyll’s sinister experiments, while the backdoor is a secret access of Hyde’s sin. Thematically, Stevenson uses the secret back entrance to symbolize the private struggle within each man to conquer his own transgressions and malice while conforming to societal conventions. In the end, Jekyll is overcome by Hyde, and locks himself behind the door, imprisoning himself within his own ruinous sin.
In conclusion, although one may realize that the exhaustive descriptions Stevenson supplies sets the tenor of his supernatural allegory, each of these narrations provides the reader with a glimpse not only into Victorian social conduct, but also into the duality of good and evil within the metaphysical transformation of Dr. Jekyll. While the theme of good and evil is obviously enacted by the experiment performed by Jekyll, it is also woven into the story by the haunting nocturnal London streets, the grandiose splendor of the doctor’s home, the disarray of Jekyll’s laboratory, and by the ominous aura of Hyde’s backdoor. Without the inclusion of these descriptions, Stevenson’s work would lack a dimensionality only provided by the settings, both as proper environments for the action, and as symbols for the deeper messages of the novella. As an audience, one understands the opulent state of Jekyll when one can imagine his grand house, and one equally realizes the evil of Hyde as the image of the laboratory door haunts him and reminds him of the bitter struggle within himself for mastery of the soul.