Victorian Gentlemen (Scottish Highers English): Revision Notes

Victorian Gentlemen

Understanding Victorian society

Robert Louis Stevenson published Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde in 1886, during the reign of Queen Victoria. The novel explores the lives of Victorian gentlemen, a social group defined by strict codes of behaviour and an obsessive concern with public reputation. To understand the novel's central conflict, you need to recognise how these social expectations shaped the characters' actions and choices.

What made a Victorian gentleman?

Social class and profession

The Victorian gentleman occupied a privileged position in society. Social class formed the foundation of gentleman status—these men came from the upper classes and held positions of authority and influence.

Profession determined whether a man could claim gentleman status. Army officers, church ministers, doctors and lawyers all qualified as gentlemen. Some middle-class men, including bankers and successful merchants, worked to achieve this status, though their claims were less secure than those born into the upper classes.

Utterson, the lawyer who narrates much of the novel, exemplifies the professional Victorian gentleman. His successful legal practice brings him wealth and respect, whilst his professional connections give him access to other gentlemen like Jekyll and Lanyon.

Expected morals and conduct

Victorian gentlemen were expected to demonstrate strong morals and show kindness, particularly towards those less fortunate. However, many people valued a gentleman's appearance and social standing more highly than his actual character. This created a society where maintaining the appearance of respectability mattered more than genuine moral behaviour.

Benefits of gentleman status

Gentleman status offered substantial advantages. These men gained access to well-paid professions like medicine and law, where they could attract wealthy clients who trusted them because of their social standing. The benefits extended beyond the individual—a gentleman could use his social connections to arrange advantageous marriages for his daughters and secure profitable positions for his sons. This network of influence made gentleman status valuable across generations.

The obsession with reputation

Public appearances

Victorian gentlemen were determined to maintain their reputations. Without a good reputation, a man lost his gentleman status entirely, along with all its associated benefits. This made reputation more valuable than almost anything else.

Gentlemen regularly walked through public spaces like Hyde Park in London. These walks served a practical purpose—they allowed gentlemen to be seen by others, reinforcing their status and respectability. In the novel, Utterson and Enfield follow this practice, taking regular walks together through London's streets.

Emotional control and hidden desires

Victorian gentlemen were expected to keep their emotions under strict control. This social pressure forced them to hide their desires for things like sex and alcohol. They could not express these natural impulses publicly without risking their reputations.

Dr Jekyll experiences this pressure acutely. In his final statement, he explains that he "concealed" his "pleasures" to maintain his respectable image. This suppression made him feel like a "double dealer" even before he created Hyde—he was already living a double life, presenting one face to society whilst hiding his true desires. This internal conflict drives his scientific experiments and his eventual creation of Hyde as an outlet for his hidden self.

Hypocrisy and blackmail

Many Victorian gentlemen lived hypocritical lives. They would publicly express disdain for disreputable places like public houses and brothels, condemning such locations as immoral. Yet these same men would visit these places secretly at night. Stevenson uses the novel to expose this hypocrisy—the gap between public morality and private behaviour.

This double life created serious risks. Gentlemen were prepared to pay large sums of money to keep their private activities hidden, which made them vulnerable to blackmail. If their secrets became public, they would lose their reputations and their gentleman status.

Utterson assumes that Jekyll is being blackmailed about something shameful in his past. This assumption reveals how common blackmail was—Utterson immediately thinks of it as an explanation for Jekyll's strange behaviour. Even Hyde, who has no gentleman reputation to protect, offers to pay money after trampling the child, partly to avoid a public scandal. This suggests how deeply the fear of public exposure affected Victorian society.

Jekyll's confession

Jekyll's final statement includes the key quote: "I had been safe of all men's respect, wealthy, beloved". This line reveals what Jekyll valued about his gentleman status—the respect of others, material wealth, and social affection. He uses the past tense ("had been") because he knows he has lost these things through his transformation into Hyde.

The phrase shows that Jekyll understood the benefits of his position. His reputation kept him "safe"—protected from scandal and social ruin. His gentleman status brought him wealth through his medical practice and the love (or at least approval) of his social circle. By creating Hyde, Jekyll risked everything he valued, demonstrating how powerfully the pressure to suppress his desires affected him.

Remember!