In most of novels and films we reviewed this semester, the use of "doubles" serve as driving forces to the plots; the main characters end up meeting their "doubles," and they act as facets of a single identity, inhabiting a single body. However, as is often the case in stories such as these, the main characters are each presented in clear opposition to their doubles. In fact, while one character holds a positive side, the other has opposite. Therefore, the theme of good versus evil becomes manifest within a single body. In most of the cases, the main characters happen to struggle in facing their double identities, searching for their own identities and beliefs. Although the two figures are similar, a good vs. evil paradigm exists in the doubles, separating the opposing sides. .
The distinction between the protagonists and antagonists blur until the authors directly give out the fact that they are the same. The two facets of the identity are clearly shown in both the novel and film versions of Fight Club. For an example, both works delude the audience by making the narrator and Tyler Durden different people, though in reality we find out that the narrator is Tyler. Interestingly, same format applies to Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde." In one of the later chapters called, "Henry Jekyll's Full Statement of the Case," everything becomes revealed, including Jekyll's invention and his dual identity. It becomes obvious as his statement goes, "With every day, and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and the intellectual, I thus drew steadily nearer to that truth, by whose partial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two." (104) .
Although Dr. Jekyll gets fascinated from his experimentation at first, he eventually condemns his invention and regrets on his action. Similarly, when the narrator in "Fight Club," discovers that he himself is Tyler and that he has done all the actions that he thought Tyler did, he becomes paranoid and tries not to believe the fact.
