The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is one of Robert Louis Stevenson‘s most famous works.

Plot:
Gabriel Utterson is a lawyer in London who gets involved with some happenings around his friend Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, a man who seems strangely connected to Jekyll, even though Jekyll is an upstanding citizen and Hyde really doesn’t seem to be.

I loved this novella. Definitely a classic for a reason.

I’m a little late to the Robert Louis Stevenson party, I have to admit. I read Treasure Island when I was 20 or so, and that was the first thing I read by him. But I completely loved it and thought, “I have to read more Stevenson, he’s awesome.” But I never did until now. And that really is a shame.

Anyway, Jekyll and Hyde had me from the get go. I completely fell in love with the way Utterson is described:

Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance, that was never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and yet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye; something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly in the acts of his life. He was austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for vintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the doors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined to help rather than to reprove.
“I incline to Cain’s heresy,” he used to say quaintly: “I let my brother go to the devil in his own way.” In this character, it was frequently his fortune to be the last reputable acquaintance and the last good influence in the lives of down-going men. And to such as these, so long as they came about his chambers, he never marked a shade of change in his demeanour.
No doubt the feat was easy to Mr. Utterson; for he was undemonstrative at the best, and even his friendship seemed to be founded in a similar catholicity of good-nature. It is the mark of a modest man to accept his friendly circle ready-made from the hands of opportunity; and that was the lawyer’s way. His friends were those of his own blood or those whom he had known the longest; his affections, like ivy, were the growth of time, they implied no aptness in the object. Hence, no doubt, the bond that united him to Mr. Richard Enfield, his distant kinsman, the well-known man about town. It was a nut to crack for many, what these two could see in each other, or what subject they could find in common. It was reported by those who encountered them in their Sunday walks, that they said nothing, looked singularly dull, and would hail with obvious relief the appearance of a friend. For all that, the two men put the greatest store by these excursions, counted them the chief jewel of each week, and not only set aside occasions of pleasure, but even resisted the calls of business, that they might enjoy them uninterrupted.

The writing is pitch-perfect. Though it’s not an easy read – I found myself re-reading passages because I was afraid that I missed some subtleties (usually I was right about that). So it took me surprisingly long to read it (2 days instead of one). But it was very much worth it.

The story is well known and since I don’t think I can add anything new to what is already known, I’ll leave it at that.

Summarising: read it. And then watch Jekyll, which is an interesting take on the whole story, stars James Nesbitt and was written by Steven Moffat.