Context: Victorian Society and Duality
Why Context Matters
To understand The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, you need to understand the world Robert Louis Stevenson was writing in. The novella was published in 1886, during the height of the Victorian era. Victorian society shaped every character, theme and plot twist in the story.
Victorian Respectability
The Victorians placed enormous value on respectability. For middle- and upper-class men like Jekyll, Utterson and Enfield, reputation was everything. A gentleman was expected to be moral, restrained and rational at all times. Any sign of improper behaviour — gambling, drinking, sexual misconduct — could destroy a man’s standing in society.
This obsession with appearances created a culture of hypocrisy. Many Victorians lived double lives: respectable in public, indulgent in private. Stevenson’s novella directly explores this idea through Jekyll’s transformation into Hyde.
Victorian London had a stark divide between the wealthy West End and the poverty-stricken East End. Stevenson uses settings like Soho to represent the hidden, darker side of respectable society.
Science and Darwin
The Victorian period saw extraordinary scientific progress. Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859, arguing that humans had evolved from animals. This was deeply shocking to a society built on Christian beliefs. If humans were just advanced animals, perhaps the “beast” was still inside them.
Stevenson taps into this fear. Hyde is described in animalistic terms — “like a monkey,” “troglodytic.” Jekyll’s experiment suggests that the primitive, violent side of human nature can never be fully suppressed, only hidden behind a mask of civilisation.
Degeneration theory was a popular Victorian idea that humanity could evolve backwards. Scientists feared that immoral behaviour, poverty and disease could cause people to regress into primitive creatures. Hyde embodies this fear — he is smaller, younger and more ape-like than Jekyll, as though he represents an earlier, less evolved version of humanity.
Religion and Morality
Victorian Britain was deeply religious. The Church taught that good and evil were separate forces, and that moral people could resist sin through willpower and faith. Jekyll’s experiment challenges this: it suggests that evil is not external but lives inside every person.
This would have horrified Victorian readers. The idea that a respectable doctor could harbour murderous impulses struck at the heart of their moral framework.
Stevenson was raised in a strict Calvinist household in Edinburgh. Calvinism taught that humans are born sinful, which directly influenced the novella’s exploration of innate evil.
Gothic literature was hugely popular in the Victorian era. Writers like Mary Shelley (Frankenstein) and Bram Stoker (Dracula) explored fears about science, morality and the unknown. Stevenson’s novella fits squarely in the Gothic tradition: it features a mad scientist, a monstrous double, dark London streets and an atmosphere of creeping dread.
The Gothic genre allowed Victorian writers to explore taboo subjects — violence, desire, madness — in a way that “respectable” fiction could not.
Stevenson’s Life
Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh in 1850. Edinburgh itself was a city of contrasts: the elegant, respectable New Town and the dark, crowded Old Town existed side by side. This real-life duality influenced the novella’s exploration of hidden identities.
Stevenson reportedly wrote the first draft of the novella in just three days after a vivid nightmare. His wife Fanny criticised the draft for being too much of a straightforward horror story, so he burned it and rewrote it as an allegory about the duality of human nature.
Stevenson was fascinated by the real-life story of Deacon Brodie, an 18th-century Edinburgh cabinet-maker who was a respected citizen by day and a burglar by night. Brodie was eventually caught and executed. Stevenson even co-wrote a play about him. The parallels with Jekyll and Hyde are obvious — Brodie was a real-life example of Victorian duality.