In the chapter of Robert Louis Stevenson’s
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde titled “Dr.
Jekyll Was Quite at Ease,” the story’s anonymous narrator offers a brief physical
description of Jekyll that stands in stark contrast to the earlier descriptions provided
of Mr. Hyde. It is in this chapter that Dr. Jekyll is introduced to the reader rather
than serving as a narrative device in those earlier discussions of Hyde. The lawyer
Utterson is remaining late following a small dinner party hosted by Dr. Jekyll. Jekyll,
the narrator points out, has asked Utterson to remain behind after the other guests have
departed for the night, and the doctor’s request, it is suggested, is a common
occurrence, as the “dry lawyer’s” advice is frequently sought. It is during this scene
at the opening of this chapter where Stevenson’s narrator provides a brief description
of Dr. Jekyll, describing “a large, well-made, smooth-faced man of fifty, with something
of a slyish cast perhaps, but every mark of capacity and kindness — you could see by his
looks that he cherished for Mr. Utterson a sincere and warm
affection.”
This is the description of Dr. Jekyll provided
by Stevenson. The description of Dr. Jekyll’s alter-ego, Mr. Hyde, is considerably
different. Early in the novella, Enfield is discussing with Utterson a peculiar event
involving an unpleasant encounter with a stranger who had “calmly trampled” over a young
girl and “left her screaming on the ground.” Enfield’s description of this stranger
will provide the prelude to the mystery to follow:
readability="10">“It sounds nothing to hear, but it was hellish
to see. It wasn’t like a man; it was like some damned Juggernaut. . . He was perfectly
cool and made no resistance, but gave me one look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat
on me like running.”And,
referring to a doctor brought into the fracas involving the stranger’s cavalier
treatment of this child, Enfield continues,readability="9">“Well, sir, he [the doctor] was like the rest of
us; every time he looked at my prisoner, I saw that Sawbones turn sick and white with
the desire to kill
him.”Finally, describing the
scene in which the stranger, Mr. Hyde, was surrounded by angry women, Enfield states, “I
never saw a circle of such hateful faces; and there was the man in the middle, with a
kind of black, sneering coolness — frightened too, I could see that — but carrying it
off, sir, really like Satan.”Stevenson provides, in Dr.
Jekyll, the pillar of the community, a rather bland personage that is contrasted with
the personification of evil embodied by the malicious Mr. Hyde. In answering a question
as to the description Stevenson provides of Dr. Jekyll, therefore, it is perhaps not
unreasonable to include the full measure of that individual by including a description
of Hyde.
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