The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a Gothic novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, first published in 1886. The work is also known as The Strange Case of Jekyll Hyde, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, or simply Jekyll and Hyde. It is about a London legal practitioner named Gabriel John Utterson who investigates strange occurrences between his old friend, Dr. Henry Jekyll, and the evil Edward Hyde.
Inspiration may have come from the writer's friendship with an Edinburgh-based French teacher, Eugene Chantrelle, who was convicted and executed for the murder of his wife in May 1878. Chantrelle, who had appeared to lead a normal life in the city, poisoned his wife with opium. According to author Jeremy Hodges, Stevenson was present throughout the trial and as "the evidence unfolded he found himself, like Dr. Jekyll, 'aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde'. The name Jekyll was borrowed from the Reverend Walter Jekyll, a friend of Stevenson and younger brother of horticulturalist and landscape designer Gertrude Jekyll.
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is one of the most famous pieces of English literature, and is considered to be a defining book of the gothic horror genre. There have been numerous adaptations of the novella, including over 120 stage and film versions alone. The novella has also had a sizable impact on popular culture, with the phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" being used in vernacular to refer to people with an outwardly good but sometimes shockingly evil nature.
Excerpted from Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde on Wikipedia.
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
| Author | Robert Louis Stevenson |
| Country | England |
| Genre | Horror, Gothic fiction, Science fiction |
| Copyright | Public domain worldwide. |
| Book cover | Thanks to Canva |
| Ebooks | Project Gutenberg |
| Scans | Google-digitized |
| Audio | Librivox | Internet Archive Reader: Kristin Hughes 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 |
| Read online | The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde |