Hey My name is Matthew, im 16. Am writing reviews in order to save up for an ITouch, i know boring ...
Hey My name is Matthew, im 16. Am writing reviews in order to save up for an ITouch, i know boring but am going to Barbados so i need something to entertain me on the flight. Comment and i'll get back to you
Member since:22.10.2007
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Great Expectations is one of Charles Dickens best and well known work, and in my review i will be analyzing the characters, places and themes throughout the book. Dickens often wrote about children and this is no exception in this novel.
Firstly the main character is Phillip Pirrip or Pip as he is reffered to throughout the book. Pip is the protagonist in the book and the narrator, meaning it is essential for Dickens to build a strong bond between him and the reader therefore Pip has to be a believable character. And this he is, he is an orphan (which two percent of children in the Victorian age where) and he is in poverty, both easily associable points. Pips parents are dead, however we are not told how or when they died, just that Pip cannot remember them anymore. His naivety is shown as he can describe his parents from the harshness of the letters on their gravestones. When Pip writes the book he is an adult looking back on his childhood, meaning certain aspects of his memories are clouded throughout the novel. Pip is out to prove everyone wrong and rewrite family history by proving he is not destin to be a blacksmith despite what everyone says.
We first see Pip in the graveyard, and it is here where he visits his parents graves. It has a dark and Gothic style creating tension throughout the book. The Pathetic Fallacy, Dickens uses i.e. making the weather set a mood, reflects on Pip. It is important to Pip as it is his only memory of his parents,m creating sympathy for Pip.
Mr and Mrs Joe Gargery are in charge of looking after Pip. Mr Joe is a blacksmith, with a believable past, and it is him who decides to adopt Pip as their own. His marriage to Mrs Joe shows little love throughout the novel. Mrs Joe is Pips sister who often beats him as well as Mr Joe. When we first meet the characters we experience the stress of Christmas, which again makes the novel and the characters universal, accessible and believable to us.
Pip, meets Magwitch at the marshes. Magwitch is an escaped convict who forces Pip to steal a Pie at the begging of the novel. However Magwitch redeems himself by confessing to making Pip do it. Pips innocence around Magwitch is emphasized before and after, by his parents naive description, the injustice treatment at the hands of Mrs Joe and the remorse of the stealing.
Pip goes to Satis House in the Novel, and meets Estella and Miss Havisham .Miss Havisham is extremely unbelievable. She was jilted at the altar at twenty to nine, when she was younger, and has not left the chair, or removed her dress since the event. She is metaphorically dead and is rotting away slowly over time, but has never left the seat!! Miss Havisham is teaching Estella to break Mens hearts, like they did to her. Estella is very condescending and looks down on pip calling him "poor boy", and giving him his great expectations to become a gentleman and impress her. Satis house is like a ghost house, it is again Gothic in theme and and is frozen at 8:40 when Miss Havisham was jilted, and the windows are boarded up.
In my opinion there are seven main themes in the novel these are 1)Love - Pips love for Estella drives him forward in his quest to become a gentleman. 2)Obsession - Pip is obsessed with Estella and longs to change with the sole purpose of impressing her. 3)Prejudice - Estella resents Pip for not being refined. Pip is appalled by Magwitch's appearance and behavior, yet still steals for him. 4) Suffering - Miss Havisham suffers from living her whole life in the past and Pip suffers as he is has no money and is in Poverty. 5) Loneliness - Pip is often seen visiting the Graveyard where his parents are buried and can imagine how his parents look by the harshness of the letters on their tombstones. 6) Envy - Pip envies Estella's wealth and social status. This makes him jealous as she takes her wealth for granted. His great expectation in life is to achieve what Estella has. Pip is angry as he has to work hard for wealth where as Estella was born into it. This envy stays in the back of his mind as he is grows into a civilized gentleman in order to impress Estella. 7) Imprisonment - Is very common in the book and different characters experience it. i) Miss Havisham is imprisoned by time ever since she was jilted. There is also a literal imprisonment due to the boarded up windows on Satis house. ii) Magwitch, being a convict, is literally imprisoned behind bars in jail. iii) Pip is imprisoned by his love for Estella. But is more importantly imprisoned by poverty which annoys him, as he longs to be a gentlemen with money not on his side. iv) Mrs Joe is imprisoned by the burden of being a blacksmiths wife and also the burden of having to raise Pip
I recommend this to anyone who likes some classic Dickens novels, but beware depending on the publisher the book can be up to one thousand pages long and is published in three volumes. All chapters end in tension as it was originally published in a newspaper a chapter per week, meaning it was essential to keep the readers concentration and focus so they would buy it again.
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A terrifying encounter with an escaped convict in a graveyard on the wild Kent marshes; a ... more
summons to meet the bitter decaying Miss Havisham and her beautiful cold-hearted ward Estella; the sudden generosity of a mysterious benefactor - these form a s...
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