Great Expectations

“The shape of the letters on my father’s [tombstone] gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From the character and turn of the inscription, ‘also Georgiana Wife of the above,’ I drew a “conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly.” 

This opening scene also introduces Pip’s desire to better himself through learning, and his struggle to learn with the tools he has. Though he traces the letters of his parents’ tombstones with the longing to read and write, he cannot distinguish the letters, let alone the full words. In many ways, this frustration foreshadows the challenges Pip will face as he attempts to become a gentleman, learning a new language of habits, behaviors, and ideas that are difficult for him to access.

“It was not in the first few moments that I saw all these things, though I saw more of them in the first moments than might be supposed. But I saw that everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long ago, and had lost its lustre and was faded and yellow. I saw that the bride within the bridal dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and had no brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw that the dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young woman, and that the figure upon which it now hung loose had shrunk to skin and bone.”

In this moment, young Pip encounters the eccentric Miss Havisham for the first time. In addition to finding a series of clocks stopped at twenty minutes to nine—the time when her wedding was called off many years ago—he observes that the woman is a kind of time capsule, still wearing her wedding dress, veil, and bridal flowers. Of course, because so much time has passed, Miss Havisham is now old, and the wedding dress is now yellowed and decayed. This passage, in short, describes the perverse disparity between Miss Havisham’s emotional experience of frozen time, and the reality of time moving forward.

The excerpt also suggests the intensity of Miss Havisham’s bitterness as a jilted bride. She is bitter toward the whole world, shutting herself off completely, allowing her external state to reflect her disturbed internal state. This bitterness effectively fuels her plot for revenge against “the male sex” (396) employing her adopted daughter, Estella, as a surrogate “bride”: A beautiful “rounded figure of a young woman” whom she can use to break men’s hearts.

“It is a most miserable thing to feel ashamed of home. There may be black ingratitude in the thing, and the punishment may be retributive and well deserved; but that it is a miserable thing, I can testify. Home had never been a very pleasant place to me, because of my sister's temper. But, Joe had sanctified it, and I had believed in it. […] I had believed in the kitchen as a chaste though not magnificent apartment; I had believed in the forge as the glowing road to manhood and independence. Within a single year all this was changed. Now it was all coarse and common, and I would not have had Miss Havisham and Estella see it on any account.” 

After spending time with the wealthy Miss Havisham and her distinguished, beautiful adopted daughter Estella, Pip begins to feel ashamed of his humble existence with Joe the blacksmith. In this passage, Pip points out that he was never aware of his class status until he observed the extreme contrast of Estella’s life at Satis House (and thus came to perceive his own life as “coarse and common”). This passage also significantly introduces the theme of “home,” which will return in Chapter 44 when Wemmick sends Pip a note warning, “DON’T GO HOME” (818).

“What stung me, was the identification of the whole affair with my unoffending self. When Barnwell began to go wrong, I declare that I felt positively apologetic, Pumblechook's indignant stare so taxed me with it. Wopsle, too, took pains to present me in the worst light. At once ferocious and maudlin, I was made to murder my uncle with no extenuating circumstances whatever; Millwood put me down in argument, on every occasion; it became sheer monomania in my master's daughter to care a button for me; and all I can say for my gasping and procrastinating conduct on the fatal morning, is, that it was worthy of the general feebleness of my character.” 

In this scene, Wopsle reads from The London Merchant, an enduringly popular melodramatic play by George Lillo wherein a prostitute seduces the main character, George Barnwell, leading him into immoral activities. The fact that Pip identifies so fully with Barnwell is telling, as Lillo’s character experiences deep guilt and crises of conscience throughout the play. Barnwell’s hapless relationship with the prostitute also grimly foreshadows Pip’s own obsessive love for Estella, who is not a literal prostitute but is coldly using men to rise up in material status and exact Miss Havisham’s “plan.” 

“If I could have settled down and been but half as fond of the forge as I was when I was little, I know it would have been much better for me. You and I and Joe would have wanted nothing then, and Joe and I would perhaps have gone partners when I was out of my time, and I might even have grown up to keep company with you, and we might have sat on this very bank on a fine Sunday, quite different people.”

Here, Pip contemplates how his life might have turned out differently if he had never met Estella and had therefore never begun to desire the education and material advancements of a gentleman. This passage further establishes that Pip’s dissatisfaction with his life and poverty did not arise organically. Rather, it arose when he was privy to a different lifestyle and different possibilities and the prejudices wealthy gentry hold over “commoners.”

“Do you want to be a gentleman, to spite her or to gain her over? […] Because, if it is to spite her, […] I should think—but you know best—that might be better and more independently done by caring nothing for her words. And if it is to gain her over, I “should think—but you know best—she was not worth gaining over.” 

In this passage, Biddy warns Pip to carefully consider his motivations for becoming a gentleman. She cautions him against using material advancement “to spite [Estella]” and obtain revenge for her classist, dismissive behavior (which is an ironic warning because Estella is, effectively, a tool for Miss Havisham’s revenge). She also sagely advises that Estella isn’t “worth gaining over” if her motives are for wealth, foreshadowing the cold, pragmatic materialism Estella demonstrates in Chapter 38 and Chapter 44.

“I am instructed to communicate to him, […] that he will come into a handsome property. Further, that it is the desire of the present possessor of that property, that he be immediately removed from his present sphere of life and from this place, and be brought up as a gentleman,—in a word, as a young fellow of great expectations.”

In this scene, Mr. Jaggers announces that Pip will receive financial support from a mysterious benefactor who must not be revealed and that he is expected to use this money to become a gentleman. Herein, Jaggers significantly notes that Pip has “great expectations.” In this context, the phrase refers to Pip’s advancing material prospects (i.e. “great” wealth); however, over the course of the novel, the phrase evolves into a more metaphorical suggestion of Pip’s complex mental and emotional “expectations” for his changing class status. As experiences changes Pip’s ideas of what it means to be a “gentleman,” the novel introduces new ideas connected to the phrase “great expectations.”

“That girl’s hard and haughty and capricious to the last degree, and has been brought up by Miss Havisham to wreak revenge on all the male sex.” 

Herbert Pocket speaks these lines to Pip. When Pip and Herbert first meet as adult men, they realize that they met many years ago when they were both being introduced as potential “playmates” for Estella. Herein, Herbert explains that he is glad Miss Havisham broke ties with him after his first childhood visit to Satis House, citing the way Miss Havisham uses Estella “to wreak revenge on all the male sex.” He thus implies that Miss Havisham may be using Pip to satisfy her desire for revenge and that there is no potential for a real romance between him and Estella.

“You and me is not two figures to be together in London; nor yet anywheres else but what is private, and beknown, and understood among friends. It ain’t that I am proud, but that I want to be right, as you shall never see me no more in these clothes. I'm wrong in these clothes. I'm wrong out of the forge, the kitchen, or off th’ meshes. You won’t find half so much fault in me if you think of me in my forge dress, with my hammer in my hand, or even my pipe. You won’t find half so much fault in me if, supposing as you should ever wish to see me, you come and put your head in at the forge window and see Joe the blacksmith, there, at the old anvil, in the old burnt apron, sticking to the old work.” 

When Joe comes to visit Pip in London, Pip experiences the inverse of his early encounters with Estella at Satis House. Now that Pip has begun to perceive his gentlemanly clothing, speech, and mannerisms as normal, Joe’s humble clothes and uneducated communication stand out as “wrong.” Joe is sensitive to the change in Pip’s perspective. He thus encourages Pip to return to his old “home” village and see him in an environment where he is not considered “wrong” (and thus remember his roots). 

“I loved Estella with the love of a man, I loved her simply because I found her irresistible. Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be. Once for all; I loved her none the less because I knew it.” 

Here, Pip explains that even though some part of his subconscious seems to understand that he can’t be with Estella, he loves her regardless. This understanding is especially significant when Pip learns that Miss Havisham has no intention of uniting Pip and Estella. It is also important when Estella later reveals her cold nature. Through passages such as this, Dickens suggests that Estella and Miss Havisham callously take advantage of the fact that Pip will continue to love Estella regardless of obstacle or outcome.

“Hear me, Pip! I adopted her, to be loved. I bred her and educated her, to be loved. I developed her into what she is, that she might be loved. Love her! […] I’ll tell you […] what real love is. It is blind devotion, unquestioning self-humiliation, utter submission, trust and belief against yourself and against the whole world, giving up your whole heart and soul to the smiter—as I did!” 

Miss Havisham speaks these lines to Pip when she presents him with the beautiful and refined adult Estella. Dickens portrays Miss Havisham’s feverish, crazed tone through repetition and short, frantic sentences (in addition to the disturbing message of her words themselves). Herein, she actively encourages Pip to fall in love with Estella just as she fell in love with the conman Compeyson, suggesting that Pip—like Miss Havisham—is destined for betrayal and deep personal injury. 

“As I had grown accustomed to my expectations, I had insensibly begun to notice their effect upon myself and those around me. Their influence on my own character I disguised from my recognition as much as possible, but I knew very well that it was not all good. I lived in a state of chronic uneasiness respecting my behavior to Joe. My conscience was not by any means comfortable about Biddy. When I woke up in the night—like Camilla—I used to think, with a weariness on my spirits, that I should have been happier and better if I had never seen Miss Havisham's face, and had risen to manhood content to be partners with Joe in the honest old forge. Many a time of an evening, when I sat alone looking at the fire, I thought, after all there was no fire like the forge fire and the kitchen fire at home.” 

This passage ironically echoes Pip’s earlier reflections upon “home” on pages 243 and 291. Whereas Pip once saw his first home as indicative of a low class status he wished to rise above, he now sees them as reminders of the comfort and simplicity he left behind when becoming a gentleman. In this moment, he feels torn between his current lifestyle—wherein he is unable to attain the love of Estella—and his former lifestyle—which he longs for, but feels he can never return to, now that his perceptions and habits have so thoroughly changed. 

“I am what you have made me. Take all the praise, take all the blame; take all the success, take all the failure; in short, take me.” 

When Miss Havisham bemoans Estella for being cold-hearted to both her and Pip, Estella responds that Miss Havisham has raised her to be cold-hearted and vengeful. In short, Estella expresses that Miss Havisham’s conditioning (to be aloof toward men) has “made [her]” this way, and Miss Havisham must accept responsibility for the person Estella has become. This rhetoric echoes many of the comments Pip’s sister and Uncle Pumblechook made about bringing him up “by hand” earlier in the novel. In short, Great Expectations urges readers to consider how benefactors develop their adopted children as intellectual, emotional, and ideological creations. 

“And then, dear boy, it was a recompense to me, look’ee here, to know in secret that I was making a gentleman. The blood horses of them colonists might fling up the dust over me as I was walking; what do I say? I says to myself, ‘I’m making a better gentleman nor ever you’ll be!’ When one of ‘em says to another, ‘He was a convict, a few year ago, and is a ignorant common fellow now, for all he’s lucky,’ what do I say? I says to myself, ‘If I ain’t a gentleman, nor yet ain’t got no learning, I’m the owner of such. All on you owns stock and land; which on you owns a brought-up London gentleman?’ This way I kep myself a going. And this way I held steady afore my mind that I would for certain come one day and see my boy, and make myself known to him, on his own ground.” 

Herein, Magwitch—the escaped convict Pip helped many years ago—reveals that he is Pip’s secret benefactor. He explains that his years of long, hard work felt worthwhile to him because he knew they financed the “making” of Pip as a gentleman. He thus suggests that, in some ways, Pip serves as a surrogate for his own desire to rise up, to spite people who called him an “ignorant common fellow.” This rhetoric mirrors the earlier rhetoric of Miss Havisham, who developed Estella as a surrogate for her own desire for revenge.

“I was always in debt to him, always under his thumb, always a working, always a getting into danger. He was younger than me, but he'd got craft, and he'd got learning, and he overmatched me five hundred times told and no mercy.” 

In this passage, Magwitch explains how the convict Compeyson used his intelligence and gentlemanly education to take advantage of less-educated men such as himself. This moment is one of many that casts a critical light on the role of education and intelligence, suggesting that learning can be a tool for both good and evil. Later in the novel, Dickens also illustrates how the law is inclined toward classist prejudice, favoring refined, well-educated (but evil) men like Compeyson over course-mannered, less privileged (but ultimately kind-hearted) men like Magwitch. 

“They made themselves my friends […] when they supposed me to have superseded them; and when Sarah Pocket, Miss Georgiana, and Mistress Camilla were not my friends, I think. [I only want] “that you would not confound them with the others. They may be of the same blood, but, believe me, they are not of the same nature.” 

When Pip goes to confront Miss Havisham about leading him on to believe she was his secret benefactor—and thus cruelly leading him to believe he’d marry Estella—he also selflessly defends the reputation of his tutor, Matthew Pocket. He explains that Matthew is a good person and Miss Havisham should forgive him after their many years of personal disagreement and distance. This character recommendation illustrates that, despite Pip’s gentlemanly advancement, he is still a kind person who puts others before himself. Toward the end of the novel, this character recommendation leads to Miss Havisham’s generous inclusion of Matthew in her will, an act which arguably redeems her after her death. 

“When you say you love me, I know what you mean, as a form of words; but nothing more. You address nothing in my breast, you touch nothing there. I don't care for what you say at all. […] It is in my nature, […] It is in the nature formed within me. I make a great difference between you and all other people when I say so much. I can do no more.” 

In this scene, Estella reveals that she will marry Bentley Drummle despite Pip’s declaration of love for her, claiming that she is cold toward men because Miss Havisham has trained her to be so. Thus—according to Estella—it is not in her “nature” to love. This moment echoes earlier scenes wherein Dickens establishes benefactors as “makers” who determine the “nature” of their wards.

“Out of my thoughts! You are part of my existence, part of myself. You have been in every line I have ever read since I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every prospect I have ever seen since,—on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been the embodiment of every graceful fancy that my mind has ever become acquainted with. The stones of which the strongest London buildings are made are not more real, or more impossible to be displaced by your hands, than your presence and influence have been to me, there and everywhere, and will be. Estella, to the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my character, part of the little good in me, part of the evil. But, in this separation, I associate you only with the good; and I will faithfully hold you to that always, for you must have done me far more good than harm, let me feel now what sharp distress I may. God bless you, God forgive you!” 

When Estella tries to comfort Pip by saying that soon, she will be “out of [his] thoughts,” Pip explains that not only is Estella an essential part of his thoughts, she has been the sole motivating force for his rise up in status as a gentleman. Thus, his longing for Estella has always been inextricable from ideas of material and social capital. Though Estella claims to be cold toward him, these words seem to irritate her, as she later recalls his specific phrasing when they reunite 20 years later.

“Even when I thought of Estella, and how we had parted that day forever, and when I recalled all the circumstances of our parting, and all her looks and tones, and the action of her fingers while she knitted,—even then I was pursuing, here and there and everywhere, the caution, Don't go home. When at last I dozed, in sheer exhaustion of mind and body, it became a vast shadowy verb which I had to conjugate. Imperative mood, present tense: Do not thou go home, let him not go home, let us not go home, do not ye or you go home, let not them go home. Then potentially: I may not and I cannot go home; and I might not, could not, would not, and should not go home […].” 

After Pip receives a warning message from Wemmick that reads “DON’T GO HOME” (818) (because Compeyson is on the hunt for Magwitch), he contemplates the more personal, metaphorical significance of this message. He muses that he has felt unable to “go home” for a long time, as he has been incapable of either making a home with Estella or returning to the home of his childhood village. He then makes a game of conjugating the phrase “DON’T GO HOME,” recalling both his recent lessons with Matthew Pocket and his childhood lessons with Biddy. This exercise reminds the reader that Pip’s education as a gentleman has played a major role in establishing this “homeless” sensation. Pip was not born a gentleman, but he now feels incapable of undoing his gentlemanly education to fit in with Joe and Biddy.

“My dear! Believe this: when she first came to me, I meant to save her from misery like my own. At first, I meant no more. […] But as she grew, and promised to be very beautiful, I gradually did worse, and with my praises, and with my jewels, and with my teachings, and with this figure of myself always before her, a warning to back and point my lessons, I stole her heart away, and put ice in its place.” 

Distraught by the idea that she has hurt Pip, Miss Havisham summons him to beg his forgiveness and explain why she raised Estella the way she did. She describes how, as Estella grew older and more beautiful, she lost sight of her original loving intentions in her thirst for revenge. The horrifying tragedy that follows Miss Havisham’s pleas for forgiveness—coupled with her generous disbursement of her fortune—raises the question of whether she truly absolves herself.

“O Joe, you break my heart! Look angry at me, Joe. Strike me, Joe. Tell me of my ingratitude. Don't be so good to me!” 

Much like Miss Havisham, feelings of guilt plague Pip over his years of neglecting Joe. When Joe selflessly nurses Pip back to health and repays his debts, Pip begs him, “Don’t be so good to me,” feeling he does not deserve his old friend’s kindness. This moment further develops the motif of Pip’s guilty conscience and the theme of absolution seeking in Great Expectations.

There was no house now, no brewery, no building whatever left, but the wall of the old garden. The cleared space had been enclosed with a rough fence, and looking over it, I saw that some of the old ivy had struck root anew, and was growing green on low quiet mounds of ruin. 

After Miss Havisham dies, Satis House is in ruins, her wealth given away, and her belongings are auctioned off. When Pip returns to the ruins of her home 20 years later, he notices ivy growing from them, signifying the possibility of new growth and development. This passage suggests that there may be a possibility for kindness and love to flourish between Pip and Estella now that the old signifiers of capital, greed, and self-advancement are in ruins. 

“But you said to me,” returned Estella, very earnestly, “'God bless you, God forgive you!' And if you could say that to me then, you will not hesitate to say that to me now,—now, when suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but—I hope—into a better shape. Be as considerate and good to me as you were, and tell me we are friends.”

Here, Estella recalls Pip’s honest confession of love 20 years ago, suggesting that perhaps she has cared for him all along. With her testament that she has “been bent and broken, but—[she] hope[s]—into a better shape,” Estella suggests her desire for forgiveness, joining Pip and Miss Havisham in the novel’s quest for absolution.