The duplicity of man is a key theme in the novel, The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde. The separation of Jekyll into two beings, Jekyll and Hyde, is an allegory for humankind’s conflicting forces of good and evil. These characters bring to life the inner struggle between the two powers of the soul. Jekyll portrays the good side of human nature in this narrative. He is the protagonist of the novel. Dr. Jekyll is an intelligent, tall, and dignified man of late middle age. The people who know him respect him. He is a wealthy man and lives in comfort in a good house with loyal servants.
On the surface, he is the epitome of the Victorian gentleman. But he has a dark side, and he harbors secret passions. Jekyll is not supposed to represent pure good, rather, the whole of a person. The heights of virtue and the depths of vice are both extremes Jekyll possesses. From the start of the story, Jekyll is aware of this dual nature. Knowing this, he concocts a potion that will separate the two. These separate entities come in the form of Jekyll and Hyde. A stark contrast of the two beings is evident at the time of Jekyll’s first interaction with the potion.
Jekyll, a big and pleasant looking man was transformed into Hyde, a man with distorted frame and ugly countenance. Hyde’s youth and small, distorted stature can be linked to the inactive malevolence within Jekyll. At first, Jekyll is in complete control of the appearance of Hyde, having him only appear when he so wills. At this point, the good is much stronger and has control over the evil. As the iniquity within Jekyll, begins to be exercised with more regularity, it becomes more potent. Jekyll loses contact first with his good side and then with his friends. The more he plays at being Hyde the more he is cut off from their good worth.
With this newfound clout, Hyde begins to appear without Jekyll’s beckoning. This foreshadows that the evil of the human soul now begins to prevail over the once dominant good. The callous murder of Sir Danvers Carew provides the reader with a sense that malice has won complete control over merit. Jekyll is now faced with a question of morality. Should he let the evil reign, or should he quash the being he has created along with himself. It has become clear to Jekyll that he can no longer go on with this faade, and inferences that Hyde will soon seize complete control.
In an effort to stop this conquest from occurring, Jekyll decides that he will soon turn into Hyde for the last time, he declares his life over and that anything that happens after that point on will not happen to him, as Jekyll will be truly dead to the world. Therefore, it will be Hyde who will either have to face justice for the murder he has committed or find the courage to kill himself. At the end of the novel, it is Hyde’s body that was found void of any life. The triumph of good in The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, demonstrates that ultimately virtue is stronger and will reign over evil in the ongoing game of ones’ soul.