Stevenson Riassunto dettagliato, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica Stevenson Riassunto dettagliato e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON (1850- 1894)  He was born in 1850 in Edinburgh into a family of engineers. As a child his poor health forced him to spend much of his time at home and he developed a love for reading. To satisfy his father, he took a degree in law and qualified as a lawyer.  Despite his poor health, he spent four years travelling in Europe. For many years, he was seen as a writer of children's books. He published his best novels in the 1880s: Treasure Island (1883), Kidnapped (1886) and the Black Arrow (1888), which were written as children's novels and tales of historical adventure, borrowing from a tradition of Walter Scott 1 ' s works.  However,  his masterpiece,  The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde,  is a far more  complex  work. The novel  mirrors the sense of pessimism and anxiety typical of the late Victorian Age.  Dr Jekyll embodies   the   respectable Victorian gentleman :   reserved, formal and known for his charitable actions. However, like many respectable gentlemen, he leads a double life: Hyde, small and extremely ugly, is his secret alter ego, his evil “double", his “dark side", his secret nature and in the end, he takes over. (avere il soppravento).  It is Jekyll who “creates" Hyde because he likes being bad without paying the consequences. The novel is a critique of Victorian morals 2 , in  which  appearances  were   important  and  everything  was fine as  long as  corruption and vice remained in the private sphere and unknown to the world outside.  THEME OF DUALITY OF HUMAN NATURE, THE DOUBLE The novel is set in London. most of the action occurs at night 3   because that is the time when Hydes operates. Night and fog symbolize Dr Jekyll's dark side, embodied by Mr Hyde. Even Dr Jekyll's house has a symbolic meaning, representing the duality of his owner. The front door which Dr Jekyll uses has an elegant façade, which also represented Dr Jekyll’s respectability, while the back door used by Hyde is in a sinister building without windows.  The  passageway  leading   to   Jekyll's   laboratory   is   a  passage  between   two  worlds: the world of respectability and the world of evil. According to Stevenson, evil is not only outside but inside people 4 .  The theme of the double dominates the novel. Influenced by his Calvinist upbringing, in particular by the belief that we all have in us the potential for evil, Stevenson considered evil as a real presence in human nature. Mr Hyde represents Dr Jekyll's  instinctual side, whose hidden presence therefore grows more oppressive. Hyde is presented as a degenerate, physically deformed being and his deformity is a sign of a criminal "nature". Cesare Lombroso (1836-1909) believed that a criminal type could be identified from his/her physical features, such as the shape of the skull and forehead.  The novel shows that it is dangerous to try to stifle 5  your instinctual side because if you stifle it, it will become destructive. The turning point of the Victorian Age was the publication of the  Darwin’s theory, because, after it, people became aware of their  instinctual side which they had tried to repress for a long time. The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde  is one of a number of works which emerged  after the publication of Darwin's theory of evolution which tackled (affrontare) the problem of man's primordial animal side which the Victorians feared might still be present inside the civilized, socially disciplined self.  FRAME NOVEL: It has different accounts The story is told from several points of view. 1. The first is Utterson's, who is also the main narrator. Utterson is not only Dr Jekyll's friend but also his lawyer, who made his will in favour of Mr Hyde.  2. Another narrator is Mr Enfield, one of Mr Utterson's distant relatives.  3. Other narrators are a maid who witnessed Hyde's murder of a member of Parliament. 4. and Dr Lanyon, a friend of Utterson and Jekyll's, who witnessed Jekyll's transformation into Hyde.  5. It is not until the last part of the novel that Jekyll himself becomes the narrator in a final confession before he kills Hyde and himself.  However, for most of the novel we basically follow Utterson's limited point of view and we only learn the full story when he does. The effect is to keep us in the dark, and to make us share Utterson's bewilderment (smarrimento) and horror as the story proceeds.  The story of the man of science who tries to separate the evil in himself from the good draws inspiration from certain aspects of the Gothic tradition 6 . Its origins go back to the publication of Shelley's Frankenstein (1818), but Stevenson offers a more accurate analysis of man's psychological and moral nature. The story moves from the atmosphere of a mystery tale to a profounder level of  self-examination, as Jekyll explores the hidden destructive forces in himself. He combines  Gothic motifs with elements of the emerging genre of  detective fiction, characterized by unresolved crimes, scattered clues and mystery and suspense. (Detective story). THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE. Gabriel John Utterson and his cousin Richard Enfield saw the dark door of a large house on their weekly walk. Enfield told Utterson that months before he had seen a  sinister-looking man named Edward Hyde trample on a young girl after accidentally bumping into her. Enfield forced Hyde to  pay  £100  to avoid a scandal.  Hyde brought  them to this door and provided a  cheque signed by a reputable