Jekyll and Hyde

A person whose personality drastically changes between good and bad. A reference to the main character in the book Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. Ever since Kyle became a teenager, he's turned into a real Jekyll and Hyde, and it's impossible to anticipate his mood at any given time.

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

Jekyll and Hyde

someone with both an evil and a good personality. (From the novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.) Bill thinks Mary is so soft and gentle, but she can be very cruel—she is a real Jekyll and Hyde. Jane doesn't know that Fred is a Jekyll and Hyde. She sees him only when he is being kind and generous, but he can be very cruel.

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

Jekyll and Hyde

A personality alternating between good and evil behavior, as in You never know whether Bob will be a Jekyll or a Hyde. This expression comes from Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). Also see lead a double life.

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Jekyll and Hyde

a person alternately displaying opposing good and evil personalities.

The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde ( 1886 ) is a novel by Robert Louis Stevenson , in which the physician Jekyll, in order to indulge his evil instincts, uses a drug to create the persona of Hyde, which at first he can assume at will but which gradually gains control of him.

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

a ˌJekyll and ˈHyde

a person with two separate personalities or ways of behaving, one good, pleasant, etc. and one evil, unpleasant, etc: He’s a real Jekyll and Hyde. At home he shouts at his wife and children all the time; at work he’s always charming and friendly.This comes from a story by Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, in which Dr Jekyll takes a drug which separates the good and bad sides of his personality into two characters. All the negative aspects go into the character of Mr Hyde.

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

Jekyll and Hyde

An individual who has two completely different sides, one very good and the other evil. The term comes from Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), in which one character can switch from the good Dr. Jekyll to the evil Mr. Hyde by taking a drug. Leslie Purnell Davies defined it in The Shadow Before (1971), “We are all a mixture of good and evil, Jekyll and Hyde if you like.”

See also: and, Hyde, Jekyll

See also:

References in periodicals archive

Hyde, 1980 (opera); Jack Sharkey, Dave Reiser, Jekyll Hides Again!, 1984 (musical); Leslie Bricusse, Frank Wildhorn, Jekyll and Hyde, 1990 (musical); David Levy, Leslie Eberhard, Phil Hall, Dr.

Horrific Janus: doctor by day, monster by night

Hutton went on to describe Schulz's performance in ways that prefigured the narrative of Jekyll and Hyde:

Richard Mansfield, Jekyll and Hyde and the history of special effects

The permeable boundaries between the good doctor and his vicious alter ego become apparent in the climactic scene of transformation, which, reminiscent of the parasitical nature of extraterrestrial creatures in Alien (1979), also evokes a birthing scene, highlighting the symbiotic (maternal) bond between Jekyll and Hyde. The scene produces an acute sense of abjection, theorised by Julia Kristeva as the terrifying erasure of boundaries between the subject and the object of horror: 'What does not respect borders, positions, rules.

Becoming Hyde: excess, pleasure and cloning

As for the person who claims that her lover is a Jekyll and Hyde, the metaphor serves to preserve and justify her love for him, despite all the evidence that he is unworthy of it.

Mr. Hyde & the epidemiology of evil

STARRING ROLE: Dougie Carter, 17, from Durham who plays the lead in Jekyll and Hyde at the Gala Theatre, before going to acting college.

Dougie beside himself at clinching the lead role

Jekyll and Hyde - The Musical opens on Tuesday for a week-long run at the Alexandra Theatre in Birmingham.

GO: THEATRE: DUAL ROLE HYDES PAUL'S PASSION

"Everybody has an impression of Jekyll and Hyde; you have to live up to that," Zingo says.

Backstage story

Having a split personality, schizophrenia, is not a splitting of the personality into multiple parts, not a Jekyll and Hyde phenomenon, despite the popular hold of the Robert Louis Stevenson story.

From Peter Eldridge re "schizophrenia". (Letters to the Editor)

A woman accused of killing her taxi driver husband told police he could be like a Jekyll and Hyde character after he had been drinking.

Husband was 'like Jekyll and Hyde'

ITV drama Jekyll and Hyde is to be the subject of an investigation by watchdogs following complaints that it was too scary for its 6.30pm time slot.

ITV drama Jekyll [...]

For touring production Jekyll and Hyde comes to Middlesbrough [euro]eatre with a modern adaptation of the classic 19th century Stevenson tale.

Both sides of the story; JEKYLL AND HYDE, .MIDDLESBROUG / H THEATRE

A NEW adaptation of Jekyll and Hyde will be featured in Leeds.

Consumed by the search for immortality

MOTORISTS in Wales are suffering some of the highest pump prices in the country as drivers endure a "Jekyll and Hyde" attitude to petrol prices, the AA said.

High cost of filling up cars in Wales