Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?

Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?

Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre? by Tim Major

Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is one of those Victorian Gothic masterpieces that feature characters so well-known as to have eclipsed the tales in which they first appeared. Like Dracula and Frankenstein, most people reading Stevenson’s novella for the first time today are likely to be startled by the experience, or at least by the telling of the tale.

The biggest surprise, I suppose, is that the novella is a mystery story.

It’s almost impossible to imagine now, but initial readers were kept in the dark about the true nature of the relationship between Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde – it’s only in the ninth chapter out of ten that it’s finally revealed that Jekyll is capable of transforming into Hyde. Before that point, Stevenson invites the reader to speculate why Jekyll might rewrite his will to leave all his wealth to the vicious, ‘ape-like’ Hyde. Interestingly, in successive drafts he cut several suggestions that Hyde may be Jekyll’s son, and that void is filled with other hints, such as the possibility of blackmail related to a homosexual relationship.

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is not only a mystery – it also harnesses aspects of ‘true crime’ non-fiction in its witness accounts and newspaper reports. More to the point, it also features a detective, more or less. Gabriel Utterson is Jekyll’s lawyer, and though he’s responsible for leading the investigation into Hyde’s behaviour and character, he’s severely compromised. In reality, he just wants to protect his friend’s reputation and money. 

So, hah – the question in the title of this article was a trick! Jekyll and Hyde featured in a crime mystery all along.

Except… quite soon after their first appearance, they didn’t. Stevenson’s novella was a huge success upon publication in 1886, but what turned the story into a phenomenon came later, and it changed the tale irrevocably. 

Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?
Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?

Firstly, Richard Mansfield starred and co-wrote a stage adaptation which opened in 1888. Given that audiences already knew the central revelation, the adaptation abandoned the clues and non-chronological accounts and instead relied upon melodrama, primarily by introducing a love interest for Henry Jekyll, the daughter of the man Edward Hyde would go on to murder in cold blood. Many more adaptations followed, particularly once filmmaking hit its stride – the tale of Jekyll and Hyde would become the most-filmed individual work of fiction during the silent years. 

But 1888 was the year of the making of the Jekyll ‘myth’ in more ways than one.

When the first of the Whitechapel murders attributed to Jack the Ripper occurred in September 1888, Mansfield’s Jekyll and Hyde adaptation had been playing at London’s Lyceum Theatre for only a month. Inevitably, newspapers latched onto the ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ theory to suggest that murders might have been carried out not by an East-End thug, but a West-End gentleman.

So, crime and mystery is not only in the DNA of Stevenson’s novella itself, but it suffuses associations of Jekyll and Hyde in the public consciousness. 

I think you’ll agree, then, that it’s entirely reasonable to reclaim Jekyll and Hyde from the murky realm of Gothic horror and reinstate them within the crime genre.

The title gives it away. In Jekyll & Hyde: Consulting Detectives

Which takes place a decade after the original story, the pair operate as a detective duo… but a duo who can never meet, who can communicate only by means of wax-cylinder recordings, and who loathe each other. The main mysteries of the novel are external to Jekyll and Hyde, though I’ve chosen them carefully to reflect Stevenson’s themes of duality, Victorian hypocrisy and toxic masculinity. 

While all readers of the novel will already understand that Jekyll transforms into Hyde, another character is forced to learn the hard way. The third member of my detective team is Muriel Carew, Henry Jekyll’s former fiancée, who doesn’t feature in the original novella but rather the best of the film adaptations. (That is, the 1931 version directed by Rouben Mamoulian, which is simply incredible – corner me at any public event and I’ll bore you with all the reasons why I think it stands head and shoulders above the rest.) 

I’ve had the most fun reinventing Jekyll and Hyde as detectives, and there’s a sense of satisfaction in reintroducing these characters to the genre where they arguably began. But the Gothic trappings are as important to my book as they were to the original novella. My hope is that by providing new, gory Gothic surprises, modern readers can recapture some of the sense of shock experienced by the first readers of Robert Louis Stevenson’s incredible novella.

Jekyll & Hyde: Consulting Detectives by Tim Major

Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?
Why drag Jekyll and Hyde kicking and screaming into the crime genre?

Dr Jekyll and his monstrous alter-ego join forces with his ex-fiancée to solve a series of disappearances across Victorian London in this thrilling mystery, perfect for readers of Stuart Turton and James Lovegrove.

When Muriel Carew attends a lavish society party, the last person she expects to bump into is her ex-fiancée Henry Jekyll, a man she’s not seen for many years. When Jekyll turns out to be investigating a series of missing persons in London, Muriel is intrigued. But Jekyll is not working alone, and if Muriel wants to aid in the investigation, she must work with both Henry and his partner, the monstrous and uncouth Mr Hyde.

As their search takes a dark turn and a missing persons case becomes a murder investigation, Muriel finds herself deep in a mystery involving a nefarious group exploring their own hidden alter-egos within the beating heart of London’s high society.

To solve the case and bring those responsible to justice, Muriel must find a way to place her trust in Mr Hyde, which might mean uncovering secrets about her own life she never dreamed of discovering.

Tim Major

Tim Major
Tim Major

Tim Major’s novel Jekyll & Hyde: Consulting Detectives is published by Titan Books on 3rd September 2024. His other books include Snakeskins and Hope Island, three Sherlock Holmes novels, short story collection And the House Lights Dim and a monograph about the 1915 silent crime film, Les Vampires. Tim’s short fiction has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, and has been selected for Best of British Science Fiction, Best of British Fantasy and The Best Horror of the Year. Find out more at www.timjmajor.com 

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