preamble and timeline PREAMBLE: The present work is based on the novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), written by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894), and commonly associated with the rare mental condition called ‘split personality’ or ‘dissociative identity disorder’. This work can be divided in: a – general information about the author and the novel; b – focus on key-themes; c – conclusion. The input-questions served to start this work are: 1) Can the soul doubling in two? 2) How many identities exist? 3) The final suicide hides other meanings? LIFE’S TIMELINE: • Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (Edinburgh, 1850 - Vailima, 1894) was a Scottish writer, son of Thomas (a civil engineer) and Margaret (a French), by whom he inherits problems such as the tuberculosis. • Needing fresh air, first he moves to France and then he attended engineering at the Edinburgh’s University, which he left to devote himself to literature. • In the 1880 he marries Fanny Osbourne, and he writes lots of stories and novels. The best are: Treasure island (1883), Kidnapped (1885) and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). • He dies in the 1894, maybe because of a cerebral hemorrhage and he is buried in the Samoan Islands. Today his house welcomes a museum in his honor.