The double : a comparative study of Robert Louis Stevenson's The strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Oscar Wilde's The picture of Dorian Gray

Abstract

This dissertation entitled The Double: A Comparative Study of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, seeks to focus on the various uses of the theme of the double as explored by Stevenson and Wilde, most specifically from a topographical, moral and psychological standpoint. Comparative analysis will be carried out to show how these novels are essentially a product of their own age, reflective of the urban and moral architecture of fin-de-siècle London, and how through the notion of the double both Stevenson and Wilde aim to expose prevalent Victorian hypocrisy. A final psychoanalytical reading of the texts will be applied to the theme of the double using Freud's theories of the 'ego and the id' and 'the uncanny' in Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Lacan's concept of the mirror-stage and his distinction between the 'imaginary' and 'symbolic' for Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. In all three cases, the notion of the double will be co-extended to the conceit of fin-de-siècle Victorian dualism and duplicity throughout, of which they are both allegory and malady.