Category: Gothic Coffeehouse (Page 1 of 4)

In literature there are many components that make up a story and they become key components throughout. Two main components of this kind of literature called gothic literature is The spirit of perverseness and Central Gothic Irony(CGI).They two components are what help portray the stories image through characters actions and surrounding. To be more specific two stories held these components to high regard throughout its whole plot and these two were the “Black Cat” by Edgar Allen Poe and the “Strange Cases of Dr.jekyll and Mr.Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson. The way the characters of those stories were portrayed showed a very similar mental state through out change towards the end they were similar in a lot of aspects and in the “Strange Cases of Dr.jekyll and Mr.Hyde” the two main characters showed their sides of view and the way the viewed their actions and feelings and the same occurred in the ‘Black Cat” for the narrator. The spirit of perverseness which is when a character does something bad or continues to do something bad even if they know it is harmful for others,themselves or both them and others. Then it was the Central Gothic Irony which is when the character tries to come back to a state of normalcy after they have gone through and been a source of chaos in a way. So what makes them Dr.Jekyll and Mr.Hyde so similar to the narrator of the “Black Cat”?
In the “Strange Cases of Dr.jekyll and Mr.Hyde” Dr.jekyll and Mr.Hyde are the same person. The story is about the struggle between Jekyll and his other side Hyde which was caused by a potion Jekyll made to see the other side of people, the dark and

bad side, not the side made to compromise to society’s norms. At first it was him in control and he got younger when he tuned to Hyde andhe was doing little mischievous stuff he always wanted to do but no one could say nothing because they don’t know him,but later he lost control and Hyde got his own consciousness some way and caused an accident and killed Sir Devers Carew. When he came to Jekyll couldn’t stop him anymore because Hyde started to come out anytime without Jekyll’s permission and even came out when Jekyll went to sleep and continued his violence. Even though Jekyll knew what was happening he still took that potion it made him feel good and that when his addiction was shown and he saw only two options to regain control or to commit suicide and he chose the latter suicide,.His guilt came to him and he died and left a letter explaining everything about him and Hyde as a way to redeem himself and even left his close friend Mr.Utterson his will.Through that you can see the aspect of the spirit perverseness and the (CGI) from Jekyll and the cause Hyde.
In the ‘Black Cat” the story is about the narrator and his rising violent tendencies because of his drinking problem which leads to delusions. In the beginning he and his wife were people who loved animals. It was their nature but later the narrator changed. The drinking that caused him to fall into his delusion,all of his delusions were all put onto his black cat pluto. Even though he saw what was causing him to go crazy, which was the drinking he never stopped always went back to or at the end of the day. His anger towards the cat grew which led to abuse and then even led to him killing the cat. Later on he starts to come to a realization of his actions and gets a new cat because it reminded him of Pluto but because he reminded him of pluto when it was home he started to abuse it more and led to him trying to kill it but instead killing his wife who tried to protect the cat. In the end he looked back at his action which caused him to see his wrongs.

            Throughout “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, written by Robert Louis Stevenson we have encountered scenes of mysteries and violence. a character that stood out the most, meaning, one of the main characters created throughout this novel is Mr. Hyde who was created using science by Dr. Jekyll. On the other hand, we have “the Invisible Man”, an excerpt by Ralph Ellison, the invisible man being the narrator himself describing his life as an invisible person to society’s eye. Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man both have similarities as well as differences. Whether in behavior, emotions, and society’s point of view towards them. 

            Throughout the chapters of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, readers were presented with mysteries and strange cases that involve violence. The main character, Mr. Hyde is one of the characters that was the most involved and mentioned, but less seen until reaching the end of the story. Mr. Hyde can be described as a horrifying creature even though there is not a proper description of his appearance. His actions are the ones that can mostly be described due to his evil desires to cause harm. 

            Now, throughout the excerpt of “The Invisible Man”, at the beginning of the story, he described himself as a regular person with feelings, but the only difference was that he is invisible to society. Being invisible to society caused him to have this anger and distrust in society. 

            One of the similarities that stood out the most was the fact the Invisible Man almost killed an individual on the streets late at night. In comparison to Mr. Hyde, he committed a crime at night where throughout the story all his crime was done. Setting plays a huge role in both stories. Dark, which can represent a sense of evil and bad things happening which connects to the definition of Gothic.  

Throughout the first half of this semester, we have read multiple stories with multiple gothic elements. Most of the elements displayed include but are not limited to the following: cruelty, lust, fear, violence, doing the forbidden, and acting violent beyond expectation. The Lottery and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde both display these gothic elements. Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, Tessie, and Mr. Summers portray these gothic elements in their own ways. These elements are displayed mainly through external and internal conflicts.

“The Lottery” follows the story of Tessie Hutchinson and Mr. Summers who hold the lottery as a tradition annually. Just like how in today’s modern lottery a person draws tickets and matches the numbers to win a prize, Mr. Summers’ lottery has people draw pieces of paper to determine who gets to stay alive at the end of the process. At the end of the story, Tessie didn’t realize how blind she was until she ended up with the piece of paper with the black spot. She tries to escape her fate and by asking for help while Mr. Summers sits back and watches instead of participating in the lottery process. Does this mean that he hates Tessie in particular? Or does he just love keeping this tradition alive?

“The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” follows a murder mystery when a little girl gets trampled to death in the beginning of the story. Mr. Utterson was a witness to the murder and believes that Dr. Jekyll is the one behind the murder. However, Jekyll pins the blame on a man named Edward Hyde, whom nobody else has ever seen before. What everybody else doesn’t know is that Hyde is Jekyll’s alter ego, and Jekyll uses a potion to change back and forth between himself and Hyde. At first Jekyll was able to control the changes, but then it got to the point where Hyde was almost overpowering Jekyll. He got a thrill out of those he killed, but didn’t want to take the responsibility so he blames Jekyll. At the end, in mid-transition, Jekyll consumes a potion to try and kill Hyde, but in the process he commits suicide. In comparing these two characters to Mr. Summers and Tessie, I will be exploring the different conflicts between the two pairs: external conflict and internal conflict. Could lust, fear and violence be the cause of the conflicts? Or could they be the catalyst for something worse?

In comparing these four characters from both stories, I will be exploring the ideas of control, science, and the central gothic irony. The central gothic irony plays a huge part in both stories between all four characters. To answer these questions about conflict, I will first have to examine the conflict between Tessie and Mr. Summers and then examine the conflict between Jekyll and Hyde. Based on what I already know, Tessie and Mr. Summers have an external conflict since they are fighting with each other in terms of tradition and whether or not to keep the tradition of the lottery alive. Jekyll and Hyde have more of an internal conflict because they are ultimately the same person and they just switch back and forth between personalities depending on who they are around.

 Also with this comparison, I will be exploring the gothic elements of fear, violence, and control since both stories have these elements in common. I will explore who’s being feared and who’s controlling the violent acts in each story. I will also explore which character is being controlled if any. The biggest concept I want to explore is the idea of how central gothic irony plays in each story. After the results and the fates of all four characters, do these stories return to a sense of normalcy? Or is the sense of normalcy something that no longer exists?

This draft is incomplete, but I was wondering if I was going in the right direction first before continuing. Thank you!

Yarlin Peralta

ENG 3407

October 19, 2020

Midterm Essay Draft

      Dr.Jekyll/Mr.Hyde & The Invisible Man

What does being Gothic means to you? Gothic can mean many things to different people, since there’s many ways to describe that something is Gothic. However, for my understanding, after reading many pieces of Gothic literature, Gothic means something dark and mysterious, somewhat spooky and most of the time very unexpected.  In this piece of writing there will be a comparison between two characters of different stories that are considered Gothic. The two characters that will be compared  and contrasted are Dr. Jelly/Mr.Hyde as one character from the story “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr.Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson and invisible man in the story “Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison. Lastly, this piece of writing will show how both of the characters are influenced by the spirit of perverseness. 

In the story “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, during one of the Sunday walks between Mr. Enfield and the lawyer, they pass a mysterious door when Mr. Enfield starts to tell a story associated with the door. The story is about a man who walk over a girl who he left screaming on the ground but Mr. Enfield went after him and brought him back to where he left the girl to take responsibility for his actions. According to the text, “All at once, I saw two figures: one a little man who was stumping along eastward at a good walk, and the other a girl of maybe eight or ten who was running as hard as she was able down a cross street. Well, sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough at the corner; and then came the horrible part of the thing; for the man trampled calmly over the child’s body and left her screaming on the ground. It sounds nothing to hear, but it was hellish to see. It wasn’t like a man; it was like some damned Juggernaut. This is important because it shows that Mr.Hyde stumbled upon a little girl who he also walked over and then had the audacity to walk away like nothing had happened leaving her lying on the floor. This scene of the story shows Hyde’s temperament/personality and character as a person. He was a angry little man with a short temperament who clearly didn’t care if he hurt others, at the end of the day his actions didn’t really affected him, it affected Jekyll who was his other form. 

 In addition, a scene very similar to this one happens in the story “Invisible Man ” when the man was walking during the night and stumble upon a tall, blonde man with blue eyes, who said something inappropriate and disrespectful to a man, maybe to a man of color, and that man decided to beat him up because he was highly offensive to him. As stated in the text, “I accidentally bumped into a man, and perhaps because of the near darkness he saw me and called me an insulting name. I sprang at him, seized his coat lapels and demanded that he apologize. He was a tall blond man, and as my face came close to his he looked insolently out of his blue eyes and cursed me, his breath hot in my face as he struggled. I pulled his chin down sharp upon the crown of my head, butting him as I had seen the West Indians do, and I felt his flesh tear and the blood gush out, and I yelled, “Apologize! Apologize!” But he continued to curse and struggle, and I butted him again and again until he went down heavily, on his knees, profusely bleeding. I kicked him repeatedly, in a frenzy because he still uttered insults though his lips were frothy with blood. Oh yes, I kicked him! And in my outrage I got out my knife and prepared to slit his throat, right there beneath the lamplight in the deserted street, holding him by the collar with one hand, and opening the knife with my teeth — when it occurred to me that the man had not seen me, actually; that he, as far as he knew, was in the midst of a walking nightmare! And I stopped the blade, slicing the air as I pushed him away, letting him fall back to the street”. This scene is relevant because it shows that the invisible man only stops from murdering a man because he figured out that he was invisible, he knew the man was not going to be able to describe him to the authorities and or recognize him, and the reason might be because of his skin color. The invisible man started to attack a man because he didn’t like what the man told him and nearly almost killed him for not apologizing. He was a very angry man but somehow bittersweet about the fact that he was invisible, but for the most part he was kind of okay to be invisible because he was able to benefit from it. 

The differences between the scenes is that Mr. Hyde had to paid  the family of the little girl for the incident, and because it was the right thing to do out of respect of his actions. However, the girl was not badly hurt, but she was very scared. Mr. Hyde was seen by Mr. Enfield while doing such thing and then he  had to face the family and literally pay for his actions. In the other hand, the invisible man gets very angry at a man for offending him, he tries to slip the man’s throat but then decide not to because he figured out he was invisible therefore, he was not going to pay for such crime. They both walk away without  murdering anyone, for this scene at least, even though the tall blonde guy with blue eyes was badly hurt.    

Jessica Goriah

The Evil Within 

In the story “The Black Cat”, written by Edgar Allan Poe, is published in 1843. This story is written in the first person and is taken place at home. The main character is the black cat and narrator which remain nameless throughout the story. In “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, it is a novel that is written by Robert Louis Stevenson and published in the year 1886. The narration is in the first person and is told by 3 different characters from their point of view. In both stories “The Black cat” and “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, shared a similarity of self-sabotage, brutality, and redemption. The main similarity between these two stories is the theme of gothic. These stories have a sense of hate, darkness, and negative energy. The characters that are particularly the same is Mr. Edward Hyde from the novel and the narrator from the story.  The other two charters that are similar are Mr. Jekyll and the black cat they are the ones that ended up getting hurt and had good intentions. 

In “The Black Cat”, At the beginning of the story, the narrator starts off as gratified with his life. He is happily married at a young age, and he is surrounded by animals which he loves, but at some point, the narrator takes a turn and has a drinking problem known as alcoholism. Although he starts to abuse his most beloved animals and wife, he specifically goes after his black cat. He starts to scold the cat and dig the cat’s eye out and eventually killing it. In “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, Dr. Jekyll is a doctor who was a very fortunate man but felt guilty about having a dark side, so he decided to take it upon himself to try and separate the good and bad side no matter what the consequence was even if it meant possible death for him. He mixed up a couple of ingredients that created a potion. He took the potion and turned into a short and evil-looking man. Dr. Jekyll’s experiment ended up giving his bad side a form. His bad side was known as Mr. Hyde.   

According to Poe, the spirit of perseverance is what causes people to do things that they know is wrong and can be deleterious to others including himself. Spirit of perseverance is a token place in both stories one by the narrator and Mr. Hyde. In “The Black Cat”, the narrator abuses his animals and cuts the cat eye out. He isn’t just hurting the cat and animals but he’s hurting a part of himself too because he has a love for his animals. In “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, the wrong that was done was done by Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde who is part of Dr. Jekyll, accidentally tramples over a young girl, when he looks back at what he has done he had no remorse. He had full knowledge that what he did was wrong, and he hopes to get away with it. Both Hyde and the narrator committed brutality to loved ones around them. The narrator killed his cat and at the end of the story his wife as well. Mr. Hyde put Jekyll dear old friend in harm’s way. After Mr. Hyde transformed himself in front of Lanyon, he soon became sick and died within days. He also murdered Sir Danvers Carew with a cane because of rage.   

Both the narrator and Mr. Hyde blame someone for their hate and anger. Because Mr. Hyde is Dr. Jekyll suppressed dark side; Jekyll does not like him because he has only evil intentions however, Hyde dislikes Jekyll because he suppressed him his entire life and threatened to get rid of him once and for all. In “The Black Cat”, the narrator He keeps having an urge to hurt this cat like it’s the problem, but the truth is, the narrator is the problem. The black cat symbolizes the narrator’s guilt, darkness, evilness, violence, and aggression. This symbol affects the understanding of the overall meaning of the story because the narrator sees his reflection in the cat. 

Dr. Jekyll committed a few errors however he is redeemed in chapter 10. In chapter 10, before Mr. Jekyll commits suicide killing both Hyde and he writes a letter to his good friend Utterson, which explains his side of the story. He is redeemed by getting rid of Hyde once and for all while sacrificing himself. While Mr. Jekyll is stuck in Hyde’s body, he drinks poison and is found on the floor. In “The Black Cat”, rather than the narrator doing the redeeming the cat does the redemption. At the end, when the narrator kills his wife and buries her in the wall in the cellar, he doesn’t notice when the cat sneaks in the cellar with the wife. when the cops come looking for the missing wife, they hear the cat inside the basement. By doing this they find the wife, cat, at puts the narrator away in jail.     

Another similarity between Mr. Hyde and the narrator is that they both ended up self-sabotaging themselves. Although Jekyll gave his evil side a form, Hyde unknowingly caused his own demise by going on this self-centered path to evil. Hyde committed cold-blooded murder on, hurt a friend, including trampling over a girl. He also tried to take over Jekyll and his life. Both stories share a similar path, almost as a splitting image to the narrator in “The Black Cat”, who killed his wife along with the cat. Both result in their selfish motive of evil. Unconsciously to the fact that justice would prevail in both stories, Jekyll ends up killing hide and the narrator getting arrested. In both stories, they show ignorance of their actions that led to their own death or punishment. 

Shemar Tyrell 

Is change worth the risk? 

     In both novels, “the strange case of dr.jekyll and mr.hyde” by Robert louis Stevenson and “the black cat” by Edgar Allen poe , both characters dr.jekyll and the narrator of the black cat shared significant similarities but also shared some differences. Both of these characters started out as nice people but changed drastically towards the end of the novels. Both characters portrayed gothic emotions such as violence, passion, and cruelty. 

     In “the strange case of dr.jekyll and mr.hyde” dr.jekyll was a physician and a very prosperous one at that. Throughout the story he battles with the good side of himself and the bad side. That’s when we are introduced to mr.hyde who is basically jekyll’s alter ego. Jekyll develops a potion that allows him to separate his good and evil side at will but this did not work In his favor. Eventually hyde took over. One example of gothic emotions portrayed by Hyde is cruelty. “well sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough at the corner; and then came the horrible part of the thing, for the man tramples calmly over the child’s body and left her screaming on the ground”(2.49). This shows cruelty for both jekyll and hyde. Although it wasn’t really dr.jekyll who walked over the child’s body it was his creation. 

     The story black cat is based off the narrator who writes the novel from his jail cell after the events transpired. The narrator describes himself  as a very compliant person that had a love for animals. He married young and owned a lot of pets. His favorite was a his black cat pluto. The narrator begins to suffer from mood swings due to the facts that he had a obvious drinking problem. He comes home drunk one night and lashes out at pluto and cuts the cat eye. He wakes up the next morning feeling remorseful. Just like jekyll, he has two different personas due to an addictive drug. Only in this case its alcohol. He continues to be violent by killing the cat and later on kills his wife until he loses complete control of himself. This also shows the gothic terms violence and cruelty 

     INSIDE THE TWISTED MINDS OF MADMEN

      The violent actions of individuals shouldn’t be excused just because they were under the influence of a substance or possessed by someone. These characteristics are displayed by these 2 characters “Mr. Hyde” from “ The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and the Narrator from “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe. Despite their differences in morality and the motive behind their cruel actions, both characters share some similarities when it comes to the spirit of perverseness, and this helps the reader to able to judge and understand their actions and reasons to why they are so violent and commit extreme cruel acts towards others.

      The violent actions of individuals shouldn’t be excused just because they were under the influence of a substance or possessed by someone. “ The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” took place in Victorian London but to be even more specific the setting was a strange door that was discovered by Mr. Einstein and Mr. Utterson. The story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde talks about Dr. Jekyll who is an intelligent scientist, interferes with the dark side of science creating Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll occasionally transforms into Mr. Hyde who does these evil deeds which Dr. Jekyll is totally against. As time goes on Dr. Jekyll gradually loses control over himself to Mr. Hyde and Mr. Hyde continues doing the forbidden towards others. Dr. Jekyll couldn’t live with the guilt of Mr. Hyde’s actions so he ended up taking his own life putting an end to Mr. Hyde and hoping to redeem himself. “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe has a complex setting. The story was written from the narrator’s cell moments before his execution then backtracks to his initial house which later burned down. His house was filled with animals in fact he was portrayed as an animal who loved and treated all pets with care and respect. The narrator who violently mistreats his wife and his black cat Pluto when he gets drunk became a threat to everyone in his house. Pluto starts to distance himself from him due to how the narrator tortures him after he drowns himself in alcohol. One day the narrator ends up cutting one of Pluto’s eyes out and hangs it killing Pluto. The narrator later discovers a new cat who had was missing an eye too and kept it. His guilt got the best of him when he couldn’t stand the sight of the cat because it reminded him of Pluto and accidentally killing his wife with an axe trying to harm the cat. The body of his wife was discovered when the police vi.

       The violent actions of individuals shouldn’t be excused just because they were under the influence of a substance or possessed by someone. Both characters  Mr. Hyde from “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and the narrator from “ Black Cat” share similar Spirit of Perverseness. Mr. Hyde kills a respected old man Sir Danvers Carew mercilessly beating him up with a walking stick. The attack was explained in the letter Dr. Jekyll left for Mr. Utterson. ”And next moment, with ape-like fury, he was trampling his victim under foot, and hailing down a storm of blows, under which the bones were audibly shattered and the body jumped upon the roadway”( Page 37 Para.1). Mr. Hyde shows no remorse for this murder or even shows a slight feeling of guilt, Mrr Hyde allows Dr.Jerkyl to do these bad things and Mr. Hyde doesn’t feel guilty but Dr.Jekyll does. Hyde allows him to escape from the guilt because deep down Dr.Jerkyl wanted to do these bad things but should we allow Dr. Jekyll to escape with these murders just because he is someone else? Absolutely not. The spirit of perverseness in “The Black Cat” was the narrator harming and torturing Pluto and finally killing him for no reason. The narrator showed no remorse for torturing pluto every day after he gets drunk until he finally kills it. “This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself—to offer violence to its own nature—to do wrong for the wrong’s sake only—that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute.” (Page 39) The narrator clearly didn’t feel any guilt because he drowned himself in alcohol to forget the cruel things he has done then gets back and do worse. Mr. Hyde and the narrator show no remorse and lack empathy which eventually comes back to haunt them. In the “Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and “ The Black Cat” their style of narration or changes in the focal does not alter the reader or understanding because their cruel actions committed by these two characters shouldn’t be excused or forgiven whether they were under the influence of a substance or possessed. They should be held responsible for their actions

Rachel Xie 

     “ The comparison of Mr. Hyde, Invisible Man, Goodman Brown and Dr. Lanyon”

                   The comparison of Mr. Hyde, Invisible Man, Goodman Brown and Dr. Lanyon, have their differences and similarities. The gothic terms for each characters, are based on what happened to them in the story, and the gothic term for Mr. Hyde would be his gothic actions, the second gothic term for the Invisible Man would be the spirit of perverseness. The other two characters that have their similarities and differences would be Dr. Lanyon and Goodman Brown, and the gothic terms for Lanyon would be the uncanny and the other gothic term for Goodman Brown would be the fantastic. Mr. Hyde, Invisible Man, Goodman Brown and Dr. Lanyon have a story and a personality trait of their own, and they show examples of the gothic limits, whether it’s violence, death, and a return to normalcy, they each have their ways of gothic limits. 

                Mr. Hyde from the story of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, was described as small, very plainly dressed, pale, deformed and was evil looking. There wasn’t much description about Mr. Hyde appearance, but it was described enough about Mr. Hyde’s personality and that he was pure evil and cruel. The narrator from the “Prologue to the Invisible Man”,  described himself as a man with substance of flesh and bone, meaning he is a real human being, but people simply refuse to see him as one. He feels like a bodiless head in the circus like he was surrounded by the mirror of hard, distorting glass. Although not much was described about his appearance but he does see himself as a great American tradition of tinkers. As for Dr. Lanyon, another well mention character in the story of  “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, he was described as hearty, dapper, healthy, with white hair and a well manner man.  Dr. Lanyon was a close friend to Mr. Utterson, the Lawyer and to Dr. Jekyll. The last character to mention was Young Goodman Brown, he was married to his wife, Faith, three months ago and he was Christian and a good man in the story. 

               The gothic terms of the story of Mr. Hyde is gothic actions, with Mr. Hyde’s personality he is capable of doing so. Mr. Hyde was pure evil, as he tramped over a little girl’s body as she screamed and he murder one of Mr. Utterson’s client which was, Sir Danvers Carew. That shows Mr. Hyde’s actions of being irrational, acting chaotic, going against prohibitions, and being sacrilegious. For the invisible man, one of the gothic term would be the spirit of perverseness, it was based on the narrator describing his story, the Invisible Man show spirit of perverseness, knowing it would lead him to trouble, yet he still continued with his violent actions. For example, in the text of the story, he said “But he continued to curse and struggle, and I butted him again and again until he went down heavily, on his knees, profusely bleeding. I kicked him repeatedly, in a frenzy because he still uttered insults though his lips were frothy with blood.” The gothic term for Dr. Lanyon would be the uncanny, although Dr. Lanyon’s death was unexpected, it still connect his death to Dr. Jekyll, his cause of death was being shocked to death which can be possible. The action of Dr. Lanyon, does fall under the definition of Todorov’s three terms. The final gothic term for Goodman Brown is fantastic, it wasn’t clear whether what Goodman Brown was witnessing devil is real or if it was just a dream. Young Goodman Brown, he was on his was way to travel and he told his wife, Faith, to say her prayers as he leaves.  When Young Goodman Brown, was on the road  he ran into a man who is dressed in regular clothes and the man looks normal, except for the walking staff. The man tries to offer the staff for him to walk faster, but Goodman Brown refuses. As Goodman Brown continues to walk he witness a witch who admitted that she was the devil and then he saw what looks to be his wife, Faith, and he told her to look up heaven and resist the devil. As he return to the Salem Village, he has changed thinking that everyone in the village was the devil, he didn’t look at his wife or other people the same way. This shows that the action does fall under the definition of Todorov’s three terms as well, which the term was fantastic.  

                   The similarity between Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man was their actions of violence. They leave their victims screaming in pain and unable to move. For example, he said ” Oh! yes, I kicked him! And in my outrage I got out my knife and prepared to slit his throat, right there beneath the lamplight in the deserted street, holding him by the collar with one hand, and opening the knife with my teeth– when it occurred to me that the man had not seen me, actually; that he was far as he knew, was in the midst of a walking nightmare! And I stopped my blade, slicing the air as I pushed him away, letting him fall back to the street.” The example for Mr. Hyde was he trampled over a little girl’s body. Mr. Enfield said, “All at once I saw two figures: one a little man who was stumping along eastward at a good walk, and the other girl of maybe eight or ten who was running as hard as she was able down a cross street. Well sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough at the corner; and then came the horrible part of the thing; for the man trampled calmly over the child’s body and left her screaming on the ground.” Another similarity was Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man stared at a person, for example in the text, the Invisible Man said “I stared at him hard as the lights of a car stabbed through the darkness.” Mr. Hyde also stared straight at Mr. Enfield after trampling over a little girl’s body, in the text, Mr. Enfield said “He was perfectly cool and made no resistance, but gave me one look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat on me like running.” Another similarity between Mr. Hyde and Invisible Man was they don’t feel remorse when it comes to violence. As a matter of fact, the Invisible man began to laugh after he left the man lying on the ground covered in blood, and he laughed so hard that he was about to rupture himself.  The only differences between Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man was that Mr. Hyde had murder someone, but the Invisible Man hasn’t kill anyone yet. The next two character pairs that have their similarities and differences was Dr. Lanyon and Goodman Brown. One of the similarity between them was that they don’t see the people who was once closed to them the same anymore. When Goodman Brown came back to Salem Village after traveling from the road, he never look at his wife and people in the village the same. In the text it said, ” But Goodman Brown looked sternly and sadly into her face, and passed on without a greeting.” He act distant towards her after his long journey to the roads and what he witness was the devil. As for Dr. Lanyon, he was having a discussion with Mr. Utterson when he was ill and he doesn’t want to talk about Dr. Jekyll anymore. Mr. Utterson, Dr. Lanyon and Dr. Jekyll had a small party on January 8th, until Mr. Utterson went back to the doctor’s place on the 12th, 14th and the 15th, but the door was shut on him, so he went to see Dr. Lanyon. Dr. Lanyon said, “I wish to see or hear no more of Dr. Jekyll,” he said in a loud, unsteady voice. “I am quite done with that person; and I beg that you will spare me any allusion to one whom I regard as dead.” This shows that Dr. Lanyon  doesn’t see Dr. Jekyll the same anymore or even want to see him. The differences between Dr. Lanyon and Goodman Brown, was that Dr. Lanyon had died due to being scared to death, and Goodman Brown was still alive but he  sees his wife, the minister and everyone else in the village as a devil. As for personality wise, Goodman Brown was Christian and he was a good man to his wife, Faith and as for Dr. Lanyon, he was a doctor and very different from Dr. Jekyll. 

                    This conclude that, comparing Mr. Hyde, Invisible Man, Goodman Brown and Dr. Lanyon, have had their differences and similarities. Gothic terms for each characters, describing them in story, and the gothic term for Mr. Hyde would be his gothic actions, and the gothic term for the Invisible Man would be the spirit of perverseness. Another two character that have their similarity and difference would be Dr. Lanyon and Goodman Brown, and the gothic terms for Lanyon would be the uncanny and the other gothic term for Goodman Brown would be the fantastic. Mr. Hyde, Invisible Man, Goodman Brown and Dr. Lanyon have their own story to show an example of the gothic limits, whether it’s violence, death, and a return to normalcy, they each have their ways of gothic limits. 

Directions:

Students should post your draft the Midterm Essay here (minimum 250 words).  Make sure to:

1–Provide your full name and title

2–The essay should be begin by identifying the characters, stories, author names that you will explore.

3–Then students should reveal the gothic terms to be used as a frame.

4–Students should write a clear thesis and method statement.

5–Before moving to the comparison/analysis, students should provide a 1-2 sentence summary of the stories in a way that makes the comparison valid.

6–This is a formal assignment, so please proofread and use a spell/grammar check.