The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Book Summary

The story is about a rich man living in London named Dr. Henry Jekyll. He is no ordinary man. He has a split personality and a lawyer named Mr. Utterson was out do get Dr. Jekyll for his wrong doings. Dr. Jekyll was able to split himself into two different characters, one which was his normal self and the other was Edward Hyde who "was pure evil."p45. He did this by taking certain drugs. Eventually Mr. Hyde would take over his soul.

Dr. Jekyll had done some cruel things to a child once and when he was Mr. Hyde, he had to pay a sum (as a settlement) to his parents because he feared for his life. Utterson went out looking for him and couldn't find him. Utterson didn't know of Dr. Jekyll's split personality and that Dr. Jekyll was Mr. Hyde when he committed the crimes. Utterson had never heard of nor seen this Mr. Hyde. Utterson the lawyer and Dr. Jekyll were somewhat friends, but the lawyer never knew the truth about Dr. Jekyll. Utterson always saw these people as two different people not the same person.

Once again Mr. Hyde became involved in more wrong doings, this time he killed a man named Carew. The lawyer still had great difficulties finding this Mr. Hyde. "This last, however, was not so easy of accomplishment, for Mr. Hyde had numbered few familiars-even the master of the servant-maid had only seen him twice; his family could nowhere be traced; he had never been photographed; and the few who could describe him different widely, as common observers will. Only on one point were they agreed; and that was the haunting sense of unexpected deformity with which the fugitive impressed his beholders."p17

Mr. Utterson had received a letter and thought, "Henry Jekyll forge for a murder!"p21 He still hadn't acquired the truth about Dr. Jekyll. Eventually Dr. Jekyll's alter ego had gotten the best of him. Mr. Hyde had taken over Dr. Jekyll's life, soul and meaning. Dr. Jekyll finally had written a statement about the truth. In the statement, he talks about how it is Mr. Hyde responsible for the wrong doings and that a man with conscience couldn't pull off something so evil. "Many a man would have even blazoned such irregularities as I was guilty of; but from the high views that I had set before me I regarded and hid them with an almost morbid sense of shame."p42 He talked about how man has two sides and that evil is, "which I must still believe to be the lethal side of man."p45

In the statement he confesses the crimes. He tells all about himself and what really happened. We can also see this struggle, between Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, of himself as trying to determine who he really is. And the side that overcame would be who he is. Was it good or evil? "Here, then, as I lay down the pen, and proceed to seal up my confession I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end."p54

Source: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Other Stories (Barnes & Noble Classics) by Robert Louis Stevenson and Jenny Davidson. Book.