Gothic Tropes of doubling and degeneration in Dr J & Mr H & Christabel PDF

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Gothic Tropes of doubling and degeneration in Dr J & Mr H & Christabel...

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THE GOTHIC TROPES OF DOUBLING AND DEGENERATION WITHIN THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE AND “CHRISTABEL” Lucy Carlos: u1088011

GOTHIC STORIES: TERROR OVER TIME

Published in 1886, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a Gothic novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. Set in London during the 1880s, the novella follows the character of Gabriel John Utterson, a legal practitioner who investigates the dual nature of his longtime friend, Dr Henry Jekyll, whose personality is slowly destroyed by his evil alter ego Mr. Edward Hyde. The Novella employs many Gothic literary tropes, most evidently the trope of doubling, primarily symbolized through the dual nature of Dr Jekyll’s personality. As well as this, Stephenson employs the Gothic trope of degeneration through his exploration of Cesare Lombroso's theory of atavism through the character of Mr. Hyde. These Gothic tropes are also explored within Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem “Christabel”. Written in two parts, the first in 1797 and the second in 1800, Coleridge’s narrative poem “Christabel” concerns an encounter between a female character of the same name, and the stranger known as lady Geraldine, who claims to have been abducted by a gang of ruffians. Like Stevenson, Coleridge explores the Gothic tropes of doubling and degeneration within “Christabel”. This is achieved through the characters of both Geraldine, who possesses a duality of personality, and Christabel, who’s sexual exploration highlights the division between Victorian respectability and true human desire. Hence, by employing the Gothic tropes of doubling and degeneration within both The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and “Christabel”, Stevenson and Coleridge challenge the normalcies of Victorian society. The Gothic trope of doubling is apparent within both The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and “Christabel”. Within the context of literature, “doubling refers to a multiplication by two, such as when two or more characters parallel each other in action or personality. It can also mean internal doubling, or division within the self to exhibit a duality of character”[ CITATION Mar19 \l 1033 ]. The characters of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde highlight this concept. Stevenson

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manipulates Victorian anxieties through the morally angelic Dr Jekyll who respects Victorian societal normality’s and the maniacal behaviour of Mr. Hyde. However, both Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are fundamentally similar, through their sharing of one body, and in turn, the same mind. This concept of a multi-faceted human consciousness was first proposed during the Victorian era by Austrian psychoanalyst, Sigmund Freud, who suggested that the mind was separated into 4 levels of consciousness; the conscious, the subconscious, the unconscious and the ID (Elsevier 1675). Hence, Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde represent two of many potential sides to an individual that may exist within the four levels of human consciousness. Ultimately, the two characters come to represent the “imparting [of] a worrying sense of indistinguishableness between the supposed opposites” upon the reader” (Marquette University). Like Stevenson, Coleridge employs the trope of doubling within “Christabel”. This is symbolized through the character of Geraldine. Like Dr Jekyll, Geraldine exhibits a duality of character, coming to embody multiple conflicting roles within the life of Christabel. To Christabel, Geraldine comes to represent both a “figure of [her] libido [and] the mother” (Ulmer 376). Thus, both The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and “Christabel” exhibit the Gothic trope of doubling as a means to “illustrate deep anxieties […] regarding the weakening of the distinctions drawn along lines of class, gender, race and nationality, posing threats to the interests of the self” (Marquette University). The Gothic trope of degeneration is explored within both The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and “Christabel”. Within, the character of Mr. Hyde is “anatomized by scientific discourse”, in particular Cesare Lombroso’s theory of atavism in regards to criminal degeneration (Ambrosini and Dury 148-149). Lombroso suggests that “propensity toward crime was the result of atavism, a reversion to a more primitive state of human development, and such that evolutionary ‘throwbacks’ were ‘born criminals’” (Ambrosini and Dury 149). Moreover,

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Lombroso’s theory suggests the linking between physical traits and criminal behaviour. Hyde’s appearance affirms this relationship. As described by Jekyll, “Evil […] had left on that body an imprint of deformity and decay” (Stevenson 78). As well as this, throughout the novella, those who encounter Hyde describe him as “ape like” or “hardly human” (Stevenson 19). By incorporating this, Stevenson plays upon the Victorian fear of biological degeneration, chiefly sparked by the ideas explored within Darwin’s, The Origin of Species. Similarly, the character of Christabel within Coleridge’s poem, “Christabel”, also functions as an atavistic being. Like Hyde, Christabel, upon meeting Geraldine, engages in activities which emphasize the characters social transgression. Christabel’s sexual desires stray from Victorian heteronormative respectability, as she engages with homosexual desires within both a conscious and unconscious state. This is apparent as Coleridge describes Geraldine as Christabel’s lover in which “she had dreams [of] all yesternight” (Coleridge line 27). Hence, the characters of both Hyde and Christabel function as a representation of the blurring between “established boundaries between the civilized and the savage”, threatening Victorian social classifications through atavism within both a biological as well as social context (Marquette University). Thus, within both The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and “Christabel”, Stevenson and Coleridge employ the use of the Gothic tropes of doubling and degeneration. Within The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, these tropes are explored through the duality of character exhibited by Dr Jekyll, as well as the degeneration displayed by the atavistic being, Mr. Hyde. Moreover, within the poem “Christabel”, these tropes are explored through the characters of both Geraldine, who, like Dr Jekyll, possesses a duality of personality, and Christabel, who’s sexual exploration highlights the division between Victorian respectability and true human desire. By

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employing these Gothic tropes, both Stevenson and Coleridge challenge the normalcies of Victorian

society. Works Cited Ambrosini, RIchard and Richard Dury. Robert Louis Stevenson: Writer of Boundaries. Madison: Univ of Wisconsin Press, 2006. Coleridge, Samuel T. "Christabel". Poetry Foundation. 30 August 2019. Elsevier, B.V. "Only the tip of the iceberg: Who understands what about metaphor?" Journal of Pragmatics. 31.12 (1999): 1675-1683. Marquette University. "Glossary of the Gothic: Atavism." 2019. Epublications.marquette.edu. Document. 30 August 2019. Marquette University. "Glossary of the Gothic: Doubling." 2019. Epublications.marquette.edu. Document. 30 August 2019. Stevenson, Robert L. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Sydney: Planet eBook, 2018. Ulmer, William. "Christabel and the Origin of Evil." Studies in Philology. 104.3 (2007): 376-407.

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