Customer Reviews

Doctor Jekyll and Mr.Hyde (Fleshcreepers)

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When reviewing a paperback edition of a classic novel like "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", any comments are really about the additional material besides the main literary work itself, as "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" needs no recommendation from me. The additional material here is the afterword by Jerome Charyn, titled "Who is Hyde?". Charyn's tone is rather chatty, but nonetheless he raises interesting issues about hidden subtexts related to Stevenson's own life. Likewise, he notes that the story repays close reading to details and even single sentences, as clues to unexplained facets of the narrative, such as what Sir Danvers Carew was talking to Hyde about in the street before Hyde attacks Carew, and simultaneously, what the maid saw (the maid being the only female in the novel). Charyn tries at times almost to titillate readers by raising possible undercurrents of repressed sexuality, or even homosexuality, in the narrative.

Overall, a good edition of this classic story, even if my copy had one typo ("Harry Jekyl"), and it is best truly to read the Afterword after the novel, and not before.