The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

To balance the complexity of the previous chapter, Chapter 3 consists of a single scene. The purpose of this is to finally introduce Dr. Jekyll and offer a glimpse of Jekyll’s and Utterson’s relationship. Jekyll has a “sincere and warm affection” (65) for Utterson. He is visibly uncomfortable about the subject of Hyde: “The large handsome face of Dr. Jekyll grew pale to the very lips, and there came a blackness about his eyes” (66). At the mention of Hyde, Jekyll fumbles and becomes irritable. Despite his jovial and hearty front, it is apparent that Jekyll harbors a dark secret.

Utterson confronts Jekyll about his relationship with Hyde: “Jekyll, you know me: I am a man to be trusted. Make a clean breast of this in confidence; and I make no doubt that I can get you out of it” (66). In this moment, we are left to wonder how the story would have gone had Jekyll opened his heart to his friend and confessed the truth, instead of remaining closed inside his private trauma.

A striking moment occurs when Jekyll blatantly speaks of Hyde as another person, seemingly to split himself in two as he does so: “I have really a very great interest in poor Hyde. I know you have seen him; he told me so; and I fear he was rude” (66). This passage underlines the very strange predicament Jekyll is in, and the fact that his two personas are in effect two separate people.

We also hear Jekyll’s attitude toward Lanyon, after Lanyon had offered his assessment of Jekyll in the previous chapter. Jekyll considers Lanyon a “hide-bound pedant” (66) because of his adherence to conventional, rationalistic knowledge and disbelief in the “transcendental.” This cements the central intellectual conflict between Jekyll and Lanyon that will prove crucial to the plot.