1.

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is a gothic novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, first
published in 1886. The work is also known as The Strange Case of Jekyll Hyde, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, or
simply Jekyll & Hyde.

It is about a London legal practitioner named Gabriel John Utterson who investigates strange
occurrences between his old friend, Dr Henry Jekyll, and the evil Edward Hyde. The novella's impact is
such that it has become a part of the language, with the phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" entering the
vernacular to refer to people with an unpredictably dual nature: usually very good, but sometimes
shockingly evil.

PLOT: Gabriel John Utterson and his cousin Richard Enfield reach the door of a large house on their
weekly walk. Enfield tells Utterson that months ago he saw a sinister-looking man named Edward Hyde
trample a young girl after accidentally bumping into her. Enfield forced Hyde to pay £100 to avoid a
scandal. Hyde brought them to this door and provided a cheque signed by a reputable gentleman (later
revealed to be Doctor Henry Jekyll, a friend and client of Utterson). Utterson is disturbed because Jekyll
recently changed his will to make Hyde the sole beneficiary. Utterson fears that Hyde is blackmailing
Jekyll. When Utterson tries to discuss Hyde with Jekyll, Jekyll turns pale and asks that Hyde be left alone.

One night in October, a servant sees Hyde beat to death Sir Danvers Carew, another of Utterson's
clients. The police contact Utterson, who leads officers to Hyde's apartment. Hyde has vanished, but
they find half of a broken cane. Utterson recognizes the cane as one he had given to Jekyll. Utterson
visits Jekyll, who shows Utterson a note, allegedly written to Jekyll by Hyde, apologising for the trouble
that he has caused. However, Hyde's handwriting is similar to Jekyll's own, leading Utterson to conclude
that Jekyll forged the note to protect Hyde.

For two months, Jekyll reverts to his former sociable manner, but in early January, he starts refusing
visitors. Dr Hastie Lanyon, a mutual acquaintance of Jekyll and Utterson, dies of shock after receiving
information relating to Jekyll. Before his death, Lanyon gives Utterson a letter to be opened after Jekyll's
death or disappearance. In late February, during another walk with Enfield, Utterson starts a
conversation with Jekyll at a window of his laboratory. Jekyll suddenly slams the window and
disappears.

In early March, Jekyll's butler, Mr. Poole, visits Utterson and says Jekyll has secluded himself in his
laboratory for weeks. Utterson and Poole break into the laboratory, where they find Hyde wearing
Jekyll's clothes and apparently dead from suicide. They find a letter from Jekyll to Utterson. Utterson
reads Lanyon's letter, then Jekyll's. Lanyon's letter reveals his deterioration resulted from the shock of
seeing Hyde drink a serum that turned him into Jekyll. Jekyll's letter explains that he had indulged in
unstated vices and feared discovery. He found a way to transform himself and thereby indulge his vices
without fear of detection. Jekyll's transformed personality, Hyde, was evil, self-indulgent, and uncaring
to anyone but himself. Initially, Jekyll controlled the transformations with the serum, but one night in
August, he became Hyde involuntarily in his sleep.
Jekyll resolved to cease becoming Hyde. One night, he had a moment of weakness and drank the serum.
Hyde, furious at having been caged for so long, killed Carew. Horrified, Jekyll tried more adamantly to
stop the transformations. Then, in early January, he transformed involuntarily while awake. Far from his
laboratory and hunted by the police as a murderer, Hyde needed help to avoid capture. He wrote to
Lanyon (in Jekyll's hand), asking his friend to bring chemicals from his laboratory. In Lanyon's presence,
Hyde mixed the chemicals, drank the serum, and transformed into Jekyll. The shock of the sight
instigated Lanyon's deterioration and death. Meanwhile, Jekyll's involuntary transformations increased
in frequency and required ever larger doses of serum to reverse. It was one of these transformations
that caused Jekyll to slam his window shut on Enfield and Utterson.

Eventually, one of the chemicals used in the serum ran low, and subsequent batches prepared from new
stocks failed to work. Jekyll speculated that one of the original ingredients must have some unknown
impurity that made it work. Realizing that he would stay transformed as Hyde, Jekyll decided to write his
"confession". He ended the letter by writing, "I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end."

2. Frankenstein

Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel written by English author Mary Shelley (1797–
1851) that tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a hideous, sapient
creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was 18, and
the first edition of the novel was published anonymously in London on 1 January 1818, when she was
20.[2] Her name first appeared on the second edition, published in 1823.

Shelley travelled through Europe in 1814, journeying along the river Rhine in Germany with a stop in
Gernsheim, which is 17 kilometres (11 mi) away from Frankenstein Castle, where, two centuries before,
an alchemist was engaged in experiments. Later, she travelled in the region of Geneva (Switzerland)—
where much of the story takes place—and the topic of galvanism and occult ideas were themes of
conversation among her companions, particularly her lover and future husband, Percy B. Shelley. Mary,
Percy and Lord Byron decided to have a competition to see who could write the best horror story. After
thinking for days, Shelley dreamt about a scientist who created life and was horrified by what he had
made; her dream later evolved into the novel's story.

Frankenstein is infused with elements of the Gothic novel and the Romantic movement. At the same
time, it is an early example of science fiction. Brian Aldiss has argued that it should be considered the
first true science fiction story because, in contrast to previous stories with fantastical elements
resembling those of later science fiction, the central character "makes a deliberate decision" and "turns
to modern experiments in the laboratory" to achieve fantastic results. It has had a considerable
influence in literature and popular culture and spawned a complete genre of horror stories, films and
plays.

Since the novel's publication, the name "Frankenstein" has often been used to refer to the monster
itself. This usage is considered erroneous, but some commentators regard it as well-established and
acceptable. In the novel, Frankenstein's creation is identified by words such as "creature", "monster",
"daemon", "wretch", "abortion", "fiend" and "it". Speaking to Victor Frankenstein, the monster says "I
ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel" (which ties to Lucifer in Paradise Lost, which the
monster reads, and which relates to the disobedience of Prometheus in the book's subtitle).

3. Dracula

Dracula is an 1897 Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker. It introduced the character of Count
Dracula, and established many conventions of subsequent vampire fantasy. The novel tells the story of
Dracula's attempt to move from Transylvania to England so that he may find new blood and spread the
undead curse, and of the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and a woman led by
Professor Abraham Van Helsing.

Dracula has been assigned to many literary genres including vampire literature, horror fiction, the gothic
novel, and invasion literature. The novel has spawned numerous theatrical, film, and television
interpretations.

PLOT: The story is told in an epistolary format, as a series of letters, diary entries, newspaper articles,
and ships' log entries, whose narrators are the novel's protagonists, and occasionally supplemented with
newspaper clippings relating events not directly witnessed.

The events portrayed in the novel take place chronologically and largely in England and Transylvania
during the 1890s and all transpire within the same year between 3 May and 6 November. A short note is
located at the end of the final chapter written 7 years after the events outlined in the novel.

The tale begins with Jonathan Harker, a newly qualified English solicitor, visiting Count Dracula at his
castle in the Carpathian Mountains on the border of Transylvania, Bukovina, and Moldavia, to provide
legal support for a real estate transaction overseen by Harker's employer, Mr Peter Hawkins of Exeter.

At first enticed by Dracula's gracious manners, Harker soon realizes that he is Dracula's prisoner.
Wandering the Count's castle against Dracula's admonition, Harker encounters three female vampires,
called "the sisters", from whom he is rescued by Dracula. Harker soon realizes that Dracula himself is
also a vampire. After the preparations are made, Dracula leaves Transylvania and abandons Harker to
the sisters. Harker barely escapes from the castle with his life.

Dracula boards a Russian ship, the Demeter, taking along with him boxes of Transylvanian soil, which he
required in order to regain his strength. Not long afterward, the ship having weighed anchor at Varna,
runs aground on the shores of Whitby in the east coast of England.

The captain's log narrates the gradual disappearance of the entire crew, until the captain alone
remained, himself bound to the helm to maintain course. An animal resembling "a large dog" is seen
leaping ashore.

The ship's cargo is described as silver sand and 50 boxes of "mould", or earth, from Transylvania. It is
later learned that Dracula successfully purchased multiple estates under the alias 'Count De Ville'
throughout London and devised to distribute the 50 boxes to each of them utilizing transportation
services as well as moving them himself.
He does this to secure for himself "lairs" and the 50 boxes of earth would be used as his graves which
would grant safety and rest during times of feeding and replenishing his strength.

Harker's fiancée, Mina Murray, is staying with her friend Lucy Westenra, who is holidaying in Whitby.
Lucy receives three marriage proposals from Dr. John Seward, Quincey Morris, and Arthur Holmwood
(the son of Lord Godalming who later obtains the title himself).

Lucy accepts Holmwood's proposal while turning down Seward and Morris, but all remain friends.
Dracula communicates with Seward's patient, Renfield, an insane man who wishes to consume insects,
spiders, birds, and rats to absorb their "life force". Renfield is able to detect Dracula's presence and
supplies clues accordingly.

Soon Dracula is indirectly shown to be stalking Lucy. As time passes she begins to suffer from episodes of
sleepwalking and dementia, as witnessed by Mina. When Lucy begins to waste away suspiciously,
Seward invites his old teacher, Abraham Van Helsing, who immediately determines the true cause of
Lucy's condition.

He refuses to disclose it but diagnoses her with acute blood-loss. Van Helsing prescribes numerous
blood transfusions to which he, Seward, Quincey, and Arthur all contribute over time.

Van Helsing also prescribes garlic flowers to be placed throughout her room and weaves a necklace of
withered garlic blossoms for her to wear. However she continues to waste away – appearing to lose
blood every night. While both doctors are absent, Lucy and her mother are attacked by a wolf and Mrs
Westenra, who has a heart condition, dies of fright.

Van Helsing attempts to protect her with garlic but fate thwarts him each night, whether Lucy's mother
removes the garlic from her room, or Lucy herself does so in her restless sleep.

The doctors have found two small puncture marks about her neck, which Dr Seward is at a loss to
understand. After Lucy dies, Van Helsing places a golden crucifix over her mouth, ostensibly to delay or
prevent Lucy's vampiric conversion. Fate conspires against him again when Van Helsing finds the crucifix
in the possession of one of the servants who stole it off Lucy's corpse.

Following Lucy's death and burial, the newspapers report children being stalked in the night by a
"bloofer lady" ("beautiful lady"). Van Helsing, knowing Lucy has become a vampire, confides in Seward,
Lord Godalming, and Morris.

The suitors and Van Helsing track her down and, after a confrontation with her, stake her heart, behead
her, and fill her mouth with garlic. Around the same time, Jonathan Harker arrives from Budapest,
where Mina marries him after his escape, and he and Mina join the campaign against Dracula.

The vampire hunters stay at Dr Seward's residence, holding nightly meetings and providing reports
based on each of their various tasks. Mina discovers that each of their journals and letters collectively
contain clues to which they can track him down.
She tasks herself with collecting them, researching newspaper clippings, fitting the most relevant entries
into chronological order and typing out copies to distribute to each of the party which they are to study.

Jonathan Harker tracks down the shipments of boxed graves and the estates which Dracula has
purchased in order to store them. Van Helsing conducts research along with Dr Seward to analyze the
behaviour of their patient Renfield who they learn is directly influenced by Dracula.

They also research historical events, folklore, and superstitions from various cultures to understand
Dracula's powers and weaknesses. Van Helsing also establishes a criminal profile on Dracula in order to
better understand his actions and predict his movements.

Arthur Holmwood's fortune assists in funding the entire operation and expenses. As they discover the
various properties Dracula had purchased, the male protagonists team up to raid each property and are
several times confronted by Dracula.

As they discover each of the boxed graves scattered throughout London, they pry them open to place
and seal wafers of sacramental bread within. This act renders the boxes of earth completely useless to
Dracula as he is unable to open, enter or further transport them.

After Dracula learns of the group's plot against him, he attacks Mina on three occasions, and feeds Mina
his own blood to control her. This curses Mina with vampirism and changes her but does not completely
turn her into a vampire.

Van Helsing attempts to bless Mina through prayer and by placing a wafer of sacrament against her
forehead, but it burns her upon contact leaving a wretched scar. Under this curse, Mina oscillates from
consciousness to a semi-trance during which she perceives Dracula's surroundings and actions.

Van Helsing is able to use hypnotism twice a day, at dawn and at sunset, to put her into this trance to
further track Dracula's movements. Mina, afraid of Dracula's link with her, urges the team not to tell her
their plans out of fear that Dracula will be listening.

After the protagonists discover and sterilize 49 boxes found throughout his lairs in London, they learn
that Dracula has fled with the missing 50th box back to his castle in Transylvania. They pursue him under
the guidance of Mina.

They split up into teams once they reach Europe; Van Helsing and Mina team up to locate the castle of
Dracula while the others attempt to ambush the boat Dracula is using to reach his home. Van Helsing
raids the castle and destroys the vampire "sisters".

Upon discovering Dracula being transported by Gypsies, the three teams converge and attack the
caravan carrying Dracula in the 50th box of Earth. After dispatching many Gypsies who were sworn to
protect the Count, Harker shears Dracula through the throat with a kukri knife, while the mortally
wounded Quincey stabs the Count in the heart with a Bowie knife.
Dracula crumbles to dust, and Mina is freed from her curse of vampirism, as the scar on her forehead
disappears. Soon after, Quincey dies from his wounds.

The book closes with a note left by Jonathan Harker seven years after the events of the novel, detailing
his married life with Mina and the birth of their son, whom they name after all four members of the
party, but address as "Quincey". Quincey is depicted sitting on the knee of Van Helsing as they recount
their adventure. Seward and Arthur have each gotten married.

4. IT

It is a 1986 horror novel by American author Stephen King. It was his 22nd book, and his 17th novel
written under his own name. The story follows the experiences of seven children as they are terrorized
by an evil entity that exploits the fears of its victims to disguise itself while hunting its prey. "It" primarily
appears in the form of Pennywise the Dancing Clown to attract its preferred prey of young children.

The novel is told through narratives alternating between two periods and is largely told in the third-
person omniscient mode. It deals with themes that eventually became King staples: the power of
memory, childhood trauma and its recurrent echoes in adulthood and overcoming evil through mutual
trust and sacrifice.

King has stated that he first conceived the story in 1978, and began writing it in 1981. He finished writing
the book in 1985. He also stated that he originally wanted the title character to be a troll like the one in
the children's story "Three Billy Goats Gruff", but who inhabited the local sewer system rather than just
the area beneath one bridge. He also wanted the story to interweave the stories of children and the
adults they later become.

Plot: 1957–1958

During a heavy rainstorm in Derry, Maine, a six-year-old boy named Georgie Denbrough sails a paper
boat with the name S.S. Georgie his brother made for him along the rainy streets before it washed down
into a storm drain. Peering into the drain, startled from seeing a pair of glowing yellow eyes, Georgie
encounters an eccentric clown who introduces himself as "Mr. Bob Gray," a.k.a. "Pennywise the Dancing
Clown." Georgie declines a balloon while enticed by Pennywise to reach into the drain and retrieve his
boat, the clown ripping the child's arm off before leaving Georgie to die from bleeding out. His body is
later discovered and brought back to the Denbrough house.

The following June, an overweight eleven-year-old boy named Ben Hanscom is harassed by a bully
named Henry Bowers and his gang, escaping into the marshy wasteland known as the Barrens when
attacked by his tormentors on the last day of school. There, Ben befriends an asthmatic hypochondriac
named Eddie Kaspbrak and "Stuttering Bill" Denbrough, Georgie's elder brother who suffers from a
stutter and rides on a rusty bike named "Silver." The three boys later befriend fellow misfits Richie
Tozier, Stanley "Stan" Uris and Beverly Marsh, who eventually refer to themselves as "The Losers Club."
As the summer draws on, the Losers each encounter Pennywise in terrifying manifestations: a mummy
on a frozen Canal to Ben, a fountain of blood from Beverly's sink that only children can see, a diseased
and rotting leper to Eddie, drowned corpses to Stan, and a frightening phantom of Georgie to Bill. The
Losers eventually realize they are all being stalked by the same child-killing entity which killed Edward
"Eddie" Corcoran in the form of the Gill-man.

Meanwhile, an increasingly unhinged and sadistic Bowers begins focusing his attention on his African-
American neighbor Michael "Mike" Hanlon and his father. Bowers kills Mike's dog and chases the
terrified boy into the Barrens where he joins the Losers in driving Bowers' gang off in a rock fight, a
humiliated Bowers vowing revenge. Mike reveals his own encounter with Pennywise in the form of a
flesh-eating bird while showing the Losers his historical scrapbook, the group realize that "It" is a
monster with a hold on the town. Following further encounters with It, the Losers construct a makeshift
Smoke hole which Richie and Mike use to hallucinate Its origins as an ancient alien entity that came to
Earth in a meteor and feeds on children for a year before entering a twenty-seven year-long hibernation.

In late July, after Eddie is hospitalized by Bowers and several of his friends, Beverly witnesses one of the
bullies, Patrick Hockstetter, killed by It in the form of a mass of leeches while emptying a refrigerator he
used to trap and kill injured animals. The Losers later discover a message from It written in Patrick's
blood, warning them that It will kill them if they interfere. After Eddie is released from the hospital with
a broken arm, Ben makes two silver slugs out of a silver dollar on the belief that silver will harm It. The
story's narrative changes to Pennywise's perspective at that point, revealing It as a being from another
reality known as the Macroverse and that it nourishes itself on fear from terrorizing children in the
forms It assumes.

The Losers travel to the house of Neibolt Street where Eddie, Bill, and Richie had previously encountered
It, forcing Pennywise to flee into the sewers after Losers wound It with the silver slug while in the form
of a werewolf. Deeming the Losers a threat, It provides Bowers with a switchblade while manipulating
him into murdering his abusive father and recruiting his friends Victor "Vic" Criss and Reginald "Belch"
Huggins into helping him follow the Losers into the sewers to kill them. But Vic and Belch are both killed
by It in the form of Frankenstein's monster while a traumatized Bowers gets himself lost in the sewers.
In the sewers, Bill performs the "Ritual Of Chüd" he learned to face It in the Macroverse where he meets
the monster's antithesis Maturin, an ancient turtle that created the universe (which it vomited up
following a stomach-ache), who explains that It can only be defeated during a battle of wills.

Bill enters Its mind through the ritual and sees the true form of It, a mass of destructive orange lights
called the "Deadlights" before Bill defeats the monster with Mataurin's help. After the battle, not
knowing if they killed "It" or not, the Losers get lost in the sewers until the Losers perform an orgy to
bring unity back to the group.[5] The Losers then swear a blood oath to return to Derry should It
resurface. Bowers, having lost his sanity by the time he washed out of the sewers into a nearby river, is
institutionalized after being blamed for the child murders.

1984–1985
In July 1984 at the annual Derry carnival, three youths brutally attack a young man named Adrian Mellon
and throw him off a bridge. They are arrested and charged with murder when Mellon's mutilated corpse
is found. One of the murderers claims that he saw a clown dressed in a silver suit kill Mellon underneath
the bridge. Adrian's boyfriend, Don Hagarty, the other victim in the attack, had also noticed the clown
but the prosecutors convince him not to mention it during the trial.

When a string of violent child killings occurs in Derry once again, an adult Mike Hanlon, now the town's
librarian and the only one of the Losers to remain in Derry, calls up the six former members of the Losers
Club and reminds them of their childhood promise to return should the killings start again. Bill
Denbrough is now a successful horror writer living in England with his actress wife, Audra. Beverly Marsh
is a fashion designer in Chicago, who has married an abusive man named Tom Rogan, who is similar to
her abusive father. Eddie Kaspbrak has moved to New York City, where he runs a limousine rental
company and has married a hysterical codependent woman similar to his hypochondriac mother.

Richie Tozier lives in Los Angeles and works as a disc jockey. Ben Hanscom is now thin and a successful
but lonely architect, living in Nebraska. Stan Uris is a wealthy accountant residing in Atlanta, Georgia and
is married to a teacher named Patty Blum. Prior to Mike's phone calls, all of the Losers had completely
forgotten each other and the trauma of their childhood, burying the horror of their encounters with It.
However, all but Stan reluctantly agree to return to Derry. After Mike's phone call, Stan is in such fear at
the thought of facing It again that he slits his wrists in the bathtub, writing "IT" on the wall in his own
blood. Tom refuses to let Beverly go and tries to beat her, but she lashes out at him before fleeing,
causing him serious injury. The five return to Derry with only the dimmest awareness of why they are
doing so, remembering only absolute terror and their promise to return.

The Losers meet for lunch in a Chinese restaurant, where Mike reminds them that It awakens once
roughly every 27 years for 12–16 months at a time, feeding on children before going into slumber again.
The group decides to kill It once and for all. At Mike's suggestion, each person explores different parts of
Derry to help restore their memories. While exploring, Eddie, Richie, Beverly and Ben are faced with
manifestations of It (Eddie as Belch Huggins and childhood friends in leper and zombified forms, Richie
as a Paul Bunyan statue, Beverly as the witch from Hansel & Gretel in her childhood home, and Ben as
Dracula in the Derry Library). Bill finds his childhood Schwinn, "Silver", and brings it to Mike's.

Three other people are also converging on the town: Audra, who is worried about Bill; Tom, who plans
to kill Beverly; and Henry Bowers, who has escaped from Juniper Hill Mental Asylum with help from It.
Mike and Henry have a violent confrontation at the library. Mike is nearly killed but Henry escapes,
severely injured. Henry is driven to the hotel where It instructs him to kill the rest of the Losers. Henry
first attacks Eddie, breaking his arm once again, but in the fight Henry is killed.

It appears to Tom and orders him to capture Audra. Tom brings Audra to It's lair. Upon seeing It's true
form, Audra becomes catatonic and Tom drops dead in shock. Bill, Ben, Beverly, Richie and Eddie learn
that Mike is near death and realize they are being forced into another confrontation with It. They
descend into the sewers, and use their strength as a group to "send energy" to a hospitalized Mike, who
fights off a nurse that is under the control of It. They reach It's lair and find It has taken the form of a
giant spider. Bill and Richie enter It's mind through the Ritual of Chüd, but they get lost in It. In order to
distract It and bring Bill and Richie back, Eddie runs towards It and uses his aspirator to spray medicine
in It's eye and down It's throat. Although he is successful, It bites off Eddie's arm, and Eddie dies due to
blood loss. It runs away to tend to its injuries, but Bill, Richie and Ben chase after it, and find that It has
laid eggs. Ben stays behind to destroy the eggs, while Bill and Richie head toward their final
confrontation with It. Bill fights his way inside It's body, locates It's heart, and destroys it. The group
meet up to head out of It's lair, and although they try to bring Audra and Eddie's bodies with them, they
are forced to leave Eddie behind. They make it to the surface and realize that the scars on their hands
from when they were children have disappeared, indicating that their ordeal is finally over.

At the same time, the worst storm in Maine's history sweeps through Derry, and the downtown area
collapses. Mike concludes that Derry is finally dying. The Losers return home and gradually begin to
forget about It, Derry, and each other. Mike's memory of the events of that summer also begin to fade,
as well as any of the records he had written down previously, much to his relief, and he considers
starting a new life elsewhere. Ben and Beverly leave together and become a couple, and Richie returns
to California. Bill is the last to leave Derry. Before he goes, he takes Audra, still catatonic, for a ride on
Silver, which awakens her from her catatonia.