Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde example essay topic

Robert Louis Stevenson and Toni Morrison develop their main characters identities through their novels Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Bluest Eye in a rather skeptical way. In both cases we see stories of people that are not fully satisfied with their lives. The situation is probably even worth, they do not like the context of life that they have to face in their everyday activities. The reasons to that are probably the fact that they do not look at their appearance from the global standpoint and the unfriendly environment that they are surrounded with. The protagonists in both novels desire to switch their identities to the opposite in order to experience the huge differences of lives that they may possibly enjoy. Let us briefly describe the main characters that we are going to focus our attention.

One of them is the famous chemist Dr. Henry Jekyll who is willing to be whom the society extremely hates and disallows, but can enjoy the absence of guilty feeling. The characters that are represented by Toni Morison on the other hand are the ugly black girls that have to face a life of racism and isolation not by their choice but by society's cruel and discriminatory nature. Dramatically, Dr. Jekyll successfully changes his identity to Mr. Hyde, the monster; however, his will goes extremely beyond the limit, which turns out to be losing of his original identity. Consequently it is possible to say that Mr. Stevenson is telling us that the mankind is created upon self-conflict between good and evil, but it couldnt be controlled. In the other book, females, especially, Pecola, wastes her whole lifetime in pursuit of white beauty identity, but is paid with nothing but madness.

The harmfulness of seeking for ideal self-identities is revealed; in my opinion, its another factor of the tragedies in The Bluest Eye. According to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dr. Jekyll was so engrossed in his experiments that he isolated himself from society and from his two oldest friends Utterson and Lanyon. (Stevenson 12) The evil manifestation of Dr. Jekylls personality through Mr. Hyde ruled his life and overpowered him and his identity. After a sequence of the events, presenting struggle with evil, the unmitigated evil became dominant.

This urge to create a drug to distinctively identify the two personalities of man came from the physicians belief that man is not truly one, but truly two. (Stevenson 79) We can clearly see how the author develops the isolated identity of his main character Dr. Jekyll. Dr. Jekyll had secluded himself from society and from his friends; he also would not par-take in social events such as dinners and did not care to walk with his friends. Instead he confined himself to the cabinet over the laboratory, where he would sometimes sleep. (Stevenson 45) He became isolated and unfriendly, which shows how evil powers defeat the good ones that were still present at the moment.

His friends gave up hope and little by little... the frequency of Utterson visits (Stevenson 45) diminished. When Jekyll was his better and saner self, he began to realize that he was losing control over his transformations from himself to Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll had succumbed to the evil of his experiments and could no longer deal with the reality that he would need to face. Dr. Henry Jekyll segregates himself from his past life so that he may peruse his new life of scientific experimentation.

Dr. Jekyll actually has the choice whether or not to pursue his scientific experiments. This would decide whether or not he would par-take in social events and social gatherings. He would then resume a friendship with Dr. Lanyon and Mr. Utterson. He on the other hand was taken over by the evil side and could not take part in the social aspect of life. If he was able to control these evil urges, he could have been sociable like his friends but the evil manifestations of Mr. Hyde would terminate any thought of this. His experiments ruled his life and he chose not to be sociable.

He never controlled the evil temptations thus isolating him in a wicked world. He could have overcome the evil and ruled over his life but instead his isolation was due to the fact that he chose to isolate himself and would experiment with the mystical. In The Bluest Eye, we see the tragic development of the character of a black girl Pecola, which has no friends amongst white peers as well as among black ones. The reason to that is stated to be in her color, which is much more black than the color that other blacks have. The author presents her as the worst victim of self-hatred. She is little black girl with very low self-esteem.

Daily mockery from her classmates and adults made her think that she is ugly. Black e mo. Black e mo. Yadaddsleepnekked. Black e mo... (Morrison 65).

Her peers do not want to communicate with her and this makes her angry at the whole fact of her presence. You nasty little bitch. Get out of my house. (Morrison 92) Eventually, the surrounding mean society has made her believe that she is ugly and the only way to become beautiful was to have blue eyes. She prayed night after night that she would wake up with blue eye.

Lack of love and support from society and her own family, makes the girl slowly go insane. Would not it be much better if at least she had her family supporting her? She naturally desires acceptance and the love of society and her family. So on a way to her insanity she decides that the only way to be accepted is to have blue eyes like Shirley Temple. If I looked different, beautiful, maybe Cholly would be different... Maybe they would say, Why look at pretty eyed Pecola.

We mustnt do bad things in front those pretty eyes (Morrison 46). At the end of the novel, after Cholly rapes her, she goes insane and believes that she has blue eyes. She insanely thinks that people treat her badly because people were jealous of her blue eyes and she has learned to happily accept that. From the conceptual standpoint it is possible to state that Pecolas madness is due to her narrow ego and her mothers carelessness, rather than the rape. However, in this case, insane is probably the only way for her. Another character identity that is necessary to include in the evaluation is Pecolas mother, Pauline Breedlove.

She searches for her identity and ultimately her happiness after the women in the Lorain community rejected her because she bears the marks of her color and class too overtly. She wears her hair natural, she wears the clothing of country people, and she speaks with a southern accent. In the Movie Theater she realizes the difference between her and other woman. Along with the idea of romance love, she was introduced to another physical beauty.

She was never able, after her education in the movies, to look at a face and not assign it some category in the scale of absolute beauty... (Morrison 122). As she learned what physical beauty was, she also learned what it stood for. The combination of blonde hair and blue eyes equals beauty, and beauty leads to equality, worthiness, happiness, and comfort.

With this twisted theory in mind, she works as a mammy to a white family, the Fishers, which she likes over her real family. This is evident when her daughter, Pecola, visits her work place and accidentally knocks over a freshly baked pie. Pecola suffers from a burn but Pauline completely ignored Pecolas pain and instead she tended to the comforting her white daughter. Her words were hotter and darker than the smoking berries.

The little (white) girl in pink started to cry. Mrs. Breedlove turned to her and said: Hush, baby, hush. Dont cry no more (Morrison 109). The more time she spent with her real family, the more she realized how poor, ugly, and unworthy they were.

Pauline decides to completely give up on her real family and devote all her time, energy, and love to the perfect white family. However, she does not realize that by devoting herself to a servants life that is all she will ever be a black female servant in a white world. The social identity constructions influence the ways in which the characters view themselves in a somewhat sad way. The society has an opposition to the kinds of characters that were presented as main heroes of the novels. This negative pressure chases the characters throughout their lives and they cannot resist it.

They could improve the situation by at least holding on to each other within a single family, as in case of The bluest eye. Family ties are considered to be very strong. In the case of Dr. Jekyll, the situation could also be improved. Dr. Jekyll isolated himself from society according to his own personal will.

He had a plenitude of free choices to make, but the evilness of his laboratory creations took all of his individuality onto the evil side and due to his initial sane standpoints he was not able to comply with it. The society does not like anything that has to do with mystics and moreover it does not want to accept individuals that have some great involvement in it. In the case of The Bluest Eye, Morrison is showing her readers that people in this situation usually desire something- whether it be longer hair, lighter skin, or, in Pecolas case, bluer eyes- so that they can gain acceptance from both races. Pecola wishes for blue eyes because she feels they will give her the attention she covets. Since it is quite rare for a black person to have blue eyes, she would most definitely obtain that attention. These novels identity constructions show the reader a somewhat shaded path into the interpretation of the issues presented in the stories.

It can be clearly seen that Toni Morrison is trying to explain the life of a young black girl in the late 1930's, who has to live in a society where her enemies are both white and black. Pecolas identity presents the unjustified suffering and collapse of the individuality due to the external influence and a somewhat weak moral standing, and the absence of support. Sadly, this is still occurring some sixty years later. In the case of Dr. Jekyll we also see how a controversial identity of the main character leads the reader to understanding of moral issues of goodness and badness and how these issues may struggle.

Also it is shown how one notion can defeat another and the reasoning for the defeat. Jekyll wrote he kept his two lives to himself. The outside world saw a serious hard-working doctor, but there was also a fun-loving, young man. He wanted to find a drug that could give each side of his character its own separate face and body.

So he mixed the liquid. In the beginning he enjoyed the strange new thoughts and passions but as time passed Hyde became more and more evil and stronger than Dr Jekyll. He needed larger doses in order to stay in Jekylls body. Eventually the last of the old chemicals were used and so Jekyll brought the life of an unhappy man with poison to an end.

The overall impression of the novels is rather controversial. It gives the insights to some major themes of evil and good, but it leaves many questions unanswered.