TEHRAN – “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson has been published in Persian.

Qoqnus is the publisher of the novella rendered into Persian by Mehrdad Vosuqi.

Stevenson’s masterpiece of the duality of good and evil in man’s nature sprang from the darkest recesses of his own unconscious, during a nightmare from which his wife awakened him, alerted by his screams. 

More than a hundred years later, this tale of the mild-mannered Dr. Jekyll and the drug that unleashes his evil, inner persona – the loathsome, twisted Mr. Hyde – has lost none of its ability to shock. 

Its realistic police-style narrative chillingly relates Jekyll’s desperation as Hyde gains control of his soul – and gives voice to our own fears of the violence and evil within us. 

Written before Freud’s naming of the ego and the id, Stevenson’s enduring classic demonstrates a remarkable understanding of the personality’s inner conflicts – and remains the irresistibly terrifying stuff of our worst nightmares.

Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet and travel writer, and a leading representative of English literature. 

He was greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling and Vladimir Nabokov.

Most modernist writers dismissed him, however, because he was popular and did not write within their narrow definition of literature. 

It is only recently that critics have begun to look beyond Stevenson’s popularity and allow him a place in the Western canon.

Photo: A combination photo shows Robert Louis Stevenson and the front cover of the Persian edition of his novella “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”.

MMS/YAW