Part 1: Gothic Fiction: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Answers

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."We have common friends,” said Mr. Utterson."Common friends,” echoed Mr. Hyde, a little hoarsely. "Who are they?”"Jekyll, for instance,” said the lawyer."He never told you,” cried Mr. Hyde, with a flush of anger. "I did not think you would have lied.”"Come,” said Mr. Utterson, "that is not fitting language.”The other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment, with extraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and disappeared into the house.

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.This hall, in which he was now left alone, was a pet fancy of his friend the doctor’s; and Utterson himself was wont to speak of it as the pleasantest room in London. But tonight there was a shudder in his blood; the face of Hyde sat heavy on his memory; he felt (what was rare with him) a nausea and distaste of life; and in the gloom of his spirits, he seemed to read a menace in the flickering of the firelight on the polished cabinets and the uneasy starting of the shadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his relief, when Poole presently returned to announce that Dr. Jekyll was gone out.

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.The door, which was equipped with neither bell nor knocker, was blistered and distained. Tramps slouched into the recess and struck matches on the panels; children kept shop upon the steps; the schoolboy had tried his knife on the mouldings; and for close on a generation, no one had appeared to drive away these random visitors or to repair their ravages.

Which sentence uses direct characterization?

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.From that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt the door in the by-street of shops. In the morning before office hours, at noon when business was plenty, and time scarce, at night under the face of the fogged city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude or concourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen post."If he be Mr. Hyde,” he had thought, "I shall be Mr. Seek.”

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.Mr. Utterson had been some minutes at his post, when he was aware of an odd light footstep drawing near. In the course of his nightly patrols, he had long grown accustomed to the quaint effect with which the footfalls of a single person, while he is still a great way off, suddenly spring out distinct from the vast hum and clatter of the city. Yet his attention had never before been so sharply and decisively arrested; and it was with a strong, superstitious prevision of success that he withdrew into the entry of the court.

locationatmospherebackgroundperspective

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.It was a fine dry night; frost in the air; the streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the lamps, unshaken by any wind, drawing a regular pattern of light and shadow. By ten o’clock, when the shops were closed the by-street was very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of London from all round, very silent.

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.Round the corner from the by-street, there was a square of ancient, handsome houses, now for the most part decayed from their high estate and let in flats and chambers to all sorts and conditions of men; map-engravers, architects, shady lawyers and the agents of obscure enterprises. One house, however, second from the corner, was still occupied entire . . .

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.The solemn butler knew and welcomed him; he was subjected to no stage of delay, but ushered direct from the door to the dining-room where Dr. Lanyon sat alone over his wine. This was a hearty, healthy, dapper, red-faced gentleman, with a shock of hair prematurely white, and a boisterous and decided manner. At sight of Mr. Utterson, he sprang up from his chair and welcomed him with both hands. The geniality, as was the way of the man, was somewhat theatrical to the eye; but it reposed on genuine feeling.

Which image is most likely to be the setting in a work of gothic fiction?

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."Poor Harry Jekyll,” [Mr. Utterson] thought, "my mind misgives me he is in deep waters! He was wild when he was young; a long while ago to be sure; but in the law of God, there is no statute of limitations. Ay, it must be that; the ghost of some old sin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace . . .”

Read the excerpt from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.Six o’clock struck on the bells of the church that was so conveniently near to Mr. Utterson’s dwelling, and still he was digging at the problem. Hitherto it had touched him on the intellectual side alone; but now his imagination also was engaged, or rather enslaved; and as he lay and tossed in the gross darkness of the night and the curtained room, Mr. Enfield’s tale went by before his mind in a scroll of lighted pictures. He would be aware of the great field of lamps of a nocturnal city; then of the figure of a man walking swiftly; then of a child running from the doctor’s . . .