Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde Lesson Pack 4 Images and Ideas 2

It is human nature to use faces and expressions to work out if someone is friend or foe or what someone is feeling.
It was a commonly held belief that the head was the seat of the soul, hence the phrase ‘The eyes are the windows to the soul.’
Early in the Victorian period, a pseudo-science called physiognomy was popular. This was the art of judging a person’s moral character from their outward appearance, especially their face. This practice claimed to be able to know what is going on inside a person’s mind by studying the outside.
Although physiognomy was out of favour generally at the time Jekyll and Hyde was written, Stevenson was fascinated by its possibilities and its influence is clear in the constant mention of faces.
‘Troglodytic’ is a physiognomic term.