Perception

This month, well last month, we read my favorite book, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. This was my class teaching and there is one question on the Socratic Seminar that I would like to talk about. Question number five asks, “What is the significance of the fact that no one can describe exactly what Hyde looks like? This unknown, true identity of Hyde has put fear into all readers.

Everyone in our English class had a different picture of Hyde in there head. This varied from monstrous looking beast to deformed men to ordinary looking people in suites (like Dorian Gray). Also the characters in the book have different interpretations of Hyde. The reason why the people can’t describe Hyde is because everyone has a different definition of evil. I believe that Hyde is the embodiment of evil. This is why people saw him different. Thus being why he was described.

You see this in movies all the time. People will be afraid of something evil, but it has a different look to everyone. One of my favorite examples of this in a book/movie is Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Professor Lupin is teaching the class about boggarts, a shape-shifting creature that takes on the form of the viewer's worst fear. Here are some examples from the scene: Ron sees a spider, Prof. Lupin sees the moon, Neville sees Snape, Harry sees a Dementor, and Voldemort sees his own dead body.

I have read The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde six times. As I have grown and matured, my idea of evil has changed. There is evil in all of us, even those who are the nicest. Now I see evil as a regular human being, not a beast. I first read this book in 5^th and I pictured Hyde as a horrible monster. Now, reading it in 12^th grade, I picture Hyde as an everyday man. This shows how my interpretation of evil has changed.

Well this is my last post every, MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU ALWAYS

Thank you,

Ryan Sperratore