As the Mystery Unfolds: A Complicated Narrative Structure in The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Rajesh Motie College

Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is told through three narratives: Utterson’s, Lanyon’s, and Jekyll’s. Each narrative is crucial to understanding the overall mystery, none of them standing on their own. This technique turns a simple horror premise into a detective story, and Stevenson’s format is necessary given the nature of the tale. The mystery is deliberately paced to capture the reader’s attention as details are doled out, exploring themes carefully and defying expectations.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde would not have benefitted from the good doctor’s perspective being given at the beginning, because it would either eliminate the mystery or make him too suspicious. The reader is meant to be sure that Jekyll and Hyde are two different people. Stevenson is able to play with genres this way, since the story initially appears as just a crime thriller, but evolves into gothic science fiction. This allows Utterson’s descent into a mad reality. He is a respectable gentleman gradually introduced to a harsher side of his world, and the story remains tense because readers are on that same journey, not privy to further detail.

The novella is a slow burn, gradually removing rationality from Utterson’s...