Kurt Blankenheim~Blog Post 3~The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Kurt Blankenheim

Ms. Nielsen

English 9 (1)

12 May 2012

©        ®    ™

        Hola once again Solon Spartans! Here again for my last blog on The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It may seem like I'm doing my blog really early, but it was because this weekend I had read A LOT! Sadly this will be my last blog for the year, so I hope to all of you readers have a good Summer this year! So, I obviously left off on chapter eight, then finished through the whole rest of the book.  The book had got a lot better as I continued to read! Once again the author of this book is Louis Stevenson. The setting is in London, England. This book was written in 1885 and is still very mysterious!  I never knew what was going to happen next. It is all a big mystery! This murderer case was very strange (as in the title.) On some things that I was predicting was going to happen I would be right, but some wrong as well. But sometimes Stevenson would give foreshadows of what might happen. And finally after being curious so much about who the assassin was, I finally know! I kept on thinking next chapter the author will tell me but he finally did in chapter 10! The very last chapter in the novel! This story was filled with lots of suspicion and finally gave me a relief when I figured out who did the crime! A VERY good book!
           The protagonist  is Henry Jekyll. He is a doctor, and everyone enjoys him. He likes to do many experiments. There's also Mr. Utterson who is a strong lawyer. Then there's Mr. Edward who is a very weird man who is always mean and violent. Based on knowing that about this character I have a feeling that he might be a "murderer." There's Mr. Enfield who is the cousin of Mr. Utterson. Then lastly there is Dr. Lanyon who is also another doctor. She used to be one of Jekyll's best friends but has become an antagonist because of jealousy. So where I left off was when Dr. Jekyll mysteriously and rapidly slammed the window and ran inside his house. This left Mr. Enfield and Mr. Utterson curious of Dr. Jekyll about the case. So in chapter eight, the scene starts with Mr. Poole, (Jekyll's butler) going to dinner with Mr. Utterson. Mr. Utterson claims to Poole that there's been a lot of "Foul Play" going on with Dr. Jekyll. The supper then ends, and Mr. Poole offers to take him to Dr. Jekyll's house, and Mr. Utterson accepts this offer. So when they arrive they walk in to the main hallway, and there's Dr. Jekyll's servants all over the place! And all of a sudden, Mr. Utterson hears a sound from another room and the man says "No visitors are allows here!" However this man isn't Jekyll, it is the owner of the fine place. Utterson and Mr. Poole quickly run way out of sight from the man, and wonder if this man could be the potential murderer, and is planning to kill them next! However, then soon realize this man is actually Mr. Hyde! With the possible danger that they could possibly be in, Mr. Utterson quickly requests to Enfield to break into his lab for safety. The person says once again to leave him alone, but Poole told them yes we need to break in! So the the first thing they see when they walk into the lab is Mr. Hyde's dead body on the ground! Next to his body there was a smashed vial of some kinda of chemical. It seems as though this might have been a suicide? However, Mr. Poole made a good point when he said that Hyde's dead body was wearing Dr. Jekyll's coat and that it looked huge on him! It made no sense why would he have someone Else's coat? They try and look around for more evidence, but they couldn't find a thing! Except a note written out for Mr. Utterson from Dr. Jekyll. This envelop contains: the first note that Jekyll was going to send originally, another note dated present day of the text, and the last note was telling Utterson to read some letter that Lanyon had sent to him and do it quickly. This is how the chapter ends and still leaves readers in even more suspense and makes them wonder what's to now come even next? I totally don't get why Mr. Hyde was wearing that jacket still! That makes me want to know what's going on so bad! It will be interesting to see what happens.
          So chapter nine obviously starts off with Mr. Utterson reading Dr. Lanyon's letter. This note was talking about Dr. Jekyll's lab and that Jekyll told him to take something out of a  cabinet and take it and hide it somewhere. Its just a mystery to Mr. Utterson to as what it could possibly be. So Lanyon did what was asked and went into Jekyll's lab and pulled out some kind of vial that was a red liquid. I think this could possibly be related to Mr. Hyde's death. However, he also found his notes about experiments he has done, but he doesn't know if it is related or not. So he went home and took the vial with him. At the strike of midnight Mr. Hyde shows up and asks for the vial. He was described "very nervous and excited." Lanyon didn't really know him so he tried to talk with him but he cut it short and again asked for the vial. So he finally handed it over and immediately added some kind of purple ingredient which turned it to some weird green color. Why the heck did he do this? So as soon as he is done mixing the liquids together he asks Dr. Lanyon if he wants to be a "witness." However, Lanyon is clueless on what Mr. Hyde means by this! He's wondering what's there to witness? But Lanyon just says sure. So Mr. Hyde takes a huge drink and immediately turns into Dr. Jekyll and replaces himself. It was like a potion that switched lives! So weird but cool! So now Mr. Hyde is Jekyll, and Jekyll is Hyde! And even though the readers and Utterson want to know even more unfortunately the letter ends there. I don't get why he would want to do this! And where does he even get all of these potions in the first place? I'm so anxious to learn more in the next and last chapter of the book!
         So chapter ten is called "Henry Jekyll’s Full Statement of the Case." Sadly this is the last chapter in the book, however, it is still probably thee most important part in the book! I couldn't wait to see what was going to happen after all of that! This chapter has a very long speech by Henry Jekyll, and would basically be considered a soliloquy. So just as in the title of the chapter it is Dr. Jekyll's statement about the murder case. He basically can't take it anymore and admits that he was the assassin! Everyone was kinda in shock mode because they all thought it was going Hyde! I even thought he was innocent! But its Jekyll! He tells everyone he bought a huge supply of liquids to make a potion. This potion he drank, turned him into Hyde. When he was Hyde, he couldn't control his behavior he claims. So he says when he was Hyde he did commit the crime. he told everyone the reason he wanted to try out this experiment was to get know what Hyde was like and try to cure his violence problems, however it obviously failed because he couldn't control it and killed someone! He says he's really sorry for what he did, and never meant to cause this much harm to the town. He didn't mean to kill Sir Carew that's just who he saw one night when he was in a bad mood, while being Hyde. So that's why Hyde was wearing Jekyll's coat because of this switch! I can't believe this Innocent man turned bad because of this potion and seemingly randomly killed some guy! That's basically how this story ends, by the huge speech of Jekyll pleading guilty! However Stevenson taught us a big lesson: don't try to be someone you aren't. Meaning like leave other people alone and worry about yourself, or you'll get into trouble! Now obviously we don't have a potion to transfer lives, but it can still be a good use as in our everyday typical lives. it was a very interesting story! I think the ending the part I just read, was the best part in the whole book! I thought that was a cool way to end the book. Stevenson teaches young people lessons to get ready for the real world. Such as: how to make friends and keep them, be yourself, and learning more about crime. And he ties all of this nicely at the end of Dr. Jekyll's very long talk to the people! I hope the readers enjoyed reading my blogs, and influences you to read it! I know I definitely liked it and will try to use these themes in my real life in the real world!
        So yes I did like this book a lot. It is a really cool mystery and very mysterious. It was always interesting to see what happened next! It is a very interesting story! I thought that Mr. Hyde would end up being the murderer. But in the the end it actually surprised me when it was Henry (Dr.) Jekyll! I think the author wrote this book to teach readers more about crime scenes and how to solve them. I think that he wanted to inspire the readers of the book to become like involved with crime scenes when they get older. I think the best character I like is Dr. Jekyll because of the relationship between him and Dr. Lanyon. It was always a huge mystery for me because of their recent arguments. I was always wondering about him and what was going to be his role in the book. He hadn't done much yet, until the very last chapter when he talked a lot about him and the murder case. So I'm glad I got to hear more from him! Even though I hoped he would help solve the crime or do something heroic, it ended up being himself! At the beginning he didn't say much or talk with anyone besides Dr. Lanyon, but he now has already changed by not being friends with Dr. Lanyon and starting to talk with Mr. Utterson more. There might be a good relationship. That's probably also why the author wrote this book to teach kids to have more friends. That's the biggest theme so far is trying to make friends and keep them. The author communicated this well throughout he book! Good lessons can be taught in books!
             When reading the book, I felt like I still needed to know more about Mr. Hyde. So I went back to reread to see what he was like. I thought it was important to reread so I could fully understand who the possible murderer is. I mostly forgot what he looked like, so I found this awesome quote that describes all about him: “He is not easy to describe. There is something wrong with his appearance; something displeasing, something downright detestable. I never saw a man I so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be deformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although I couldn’t specify the point. He’s an extraordinary-looking man, and yet I really can name nothing out of the way. No, sir; I can make no hand of it; I can’t describe him. And it’s not want of memory; for I declare I can see him this moment.”  This quote was said by Mr. Enfield who saw him one night out his window. This now gave me a way better understanding of this man and why he might look like an assassin. I think that based on that quote that makes him very creepy and scary! I hope that gives you a better understanding of who this man was and why I thought he was going to be the murderer. A few questions I would still have about this novel so far would be one how come everyone in this book suspected Mr. Hyde and basically no one ever thought it was Dr. Jekyll until the very end? Another is why would someone want to kill a man of the Parliament? Then why did Dr. Jekyll just get more involved in the story? I wish these questions could have been answered by unfortunately the novel is over! The book just kept getting better and better! What an amazing book! I would definitely recommend everyone to read this book! I could reread this book and I would still love it! It is just one of those books! So yes this is my last blog so I hope you all have a good Summer and get reading!

                                                                                                                 ~posted via Blackberry