Major Themes

Duality:

Duality is the most important theme of this story. Essentially it is what everything Jekyll does is about. He begins to reflect on the "profound duplicity of life" and the duality of man himself. Dr. Jekyll realizes "that man is not truly one, but truly two" proving the duality of man's personality (Stevenson, 78). Thus, from this he considers splitting both into "separate identities" (Stevenson, 79). The conflict therefore, centers around this duality of the soul in which Jekyll creates between his righteous and steadfast self and the evil and sinister Mr. Hyde. He creates "two characters as well as two appearances", one "inherently malign and villainous" and the other pleasant and considerate (Stevenson, 83). In this separation of the soul Jekyll intends to free the two halves of himself from one another, thus freeing himself as a whole. However, instead as the evil half begins to grow in strength to rival the good a dislike and then hate if you will grows between them. Essentially therefore the author is able to portray to the reader through the story that one's own being is dual. One side is that of the conscience and is righteous and and good. The other is a darker part of the soul which is malicious and sinister. Thus from this author is saying that each individual is a co-mingling of both. It is impossible for anyone to be purely one or the other. Therefore, no one can be purely good or purely evil.    

Playing God:

Mankind for centuries has made discoveries that have altered the way people see our world. The limits of science are being pushed now more than ever. These new discoveries raise many ethical questions. Should we play God? Throughout the story Dr. Jekyll uses his science to unethically create a second younger image of himself. Without considering the consequences Dr. Jekyll conducts his experiments for his own personal gain. Dr. Jekyll’s experiment attempts to remove part of his personality which he finds displeasing. Unfortunately by doing this Jekyll creates to different personalities of all good and all evil. Dr Jekyll’s attempts to create a perfect person create two imbalance people that do not know how to handle the world. The good side of him cannot handle the evil of the world while the evil side does not know how to control his terrible impulses. Mankind and its thirst for knowledge and progress must slow down and look at the bigger picture before making decisions, or reap the consequences.