Jekyll and Hyde Lesson Pack 1Symbolism of Doors
To be able to understand a symbolic interpretation of doors
To be able to explain your understanding of the symbolism of doors
To write your own imaginative piece about a door.
Sometimes a novel or story will have certain ideas and images that appear over and over again.
We can use these to infer different and deeper meanings from the text.
The pictures give you a clue as to what some of these images and ideas are in Jekyll and Hyde. Can you see what they are?
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.
To understand how language is influenced by context.
To be able to understand some of the context of Jekyll and Hyde.
To be able to recognise specific types of language in Jekyll and Hyde as a product of context.
To be able to explain the significance of this language at the time it was written.