The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, written by Robert Louis Stevenson, is a story rife with the imagery of a troubled psyche. Admittedly taken largely from Stevenson’s dreams, it undoubtably sheds light on the author’s own hidden fears and desires. Written at the turn of the 19th Century, it also reflects the psychology of society in general at the same time when Sigmund Freud was setting about to do the same thing. While Freud is often criticized for his seemingly excessive emphasis on sexual suppression as the leading cause of psychological disturbances, the time period in which he lived was exceedingly strict on what constituted appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Accordingly, Freud hypothesized that the majority of people were obliged to hide their unacceptable thoughts and feelings down in the depths of their unconscious from whence they would inevitably escape from at a later time to manifest in a variety of ways. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde illustrates Freud’s theory of repression throughout the entirety of the story and shows the negative consequences associated with this coping strategy.

Henry Jekyll is the character who has repressed the most and who consequently suffers the direst of outcomes. In his statement of his experiences leading up to the emergence of Edward Hyde, one anticipates the revelation of some early trauma of a fairly significant scale that would clarify the man’s need to regress to an alternate identity. However, Jekyll’s letter is free from any mention of anything of the sort. He instead emphasizes his “gaiety of disposition”, and his “guarantee” of a “distinguished future,” while steering clear of any descriptio...

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...he reveals his struggle as he “sought with tears and prayers to smother down the crowd of hideous images and sounds with which my memory swarmed against me” (57). His fight with repression was a losing battle as was everyone else’s. They made the mistake of believing that an issue can be buried deep enough in the unconscious to remain hidden forever. Had Freud’s theories been made public a few years earlier they may have realized the irrationality of their actions and that openly addressing troubling material is the only way to resolve it. For as the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde makes disturbingly clear, small problems can grow into catastrophic ones when they finally break the surface, and they inevitably will as the fog cannot hold forever.

Works Cited

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. New York: Norton, 2003.