In chapter 39, Pip’s slow, drawn-out recognition that his wealth has been based on a convict’s toil is dealt with clever suspense. Magwitch’s interrogation of Pip as to the source of his, “expectations,” is reminiscent of Pumblechook and Jaggers. Despite the scene being experienced through Pip’s viewpoint, Dickens ensures that our sympathies are equally divided between the appalled Pip and the proud, emotional convict. The chapter also reveals the convict’s mixed motives. He considers himself Pip’s “second father” and wishes to show gratitude for his act of kindness but he also wants to, “own” a gentleman. This is illustrated when Magwitch declares, “ ‘Yes, Pip, dear boy, I’ve made a gentleman on you! It’s me wot has done it!” The convict is clearly proud that despite having a treacherous, criminal background, he has managed to bring a son-like figure to prosperity. This is emphasised when Magwitch begins to point out Pip’s wealthy attributes- “A diamond all set round with rubies; that’s a gentleman’s, I hope! Look at your linen; fine and beautiful!” He is almost gleeful in his inspection of Pip’s riches, and the reader experiences delight similar to that of a father witnessing his flourishing son.
Throughout the novel, until the revealing of his mysterious benefactor, Pip is certain Miss Havisham is responsible for his inheritance. However, Joe is right that Miss Havisham suspects Pip, “ wanted something,” and her warning that, “you’ll get nothing,” is one that he should heed. By agreeing to visit Miss Havisham on a regular basis, Pip feels he is offering loyalty and kindness, but at the same time his relationship has now become similar to that of the Pocket relations. Pip’s consciousness of his class, and thus dissatisfaction with his origins, leads him to believe that the rich Miss Havisham is his secret benefactor. Pip thus becomes alarmed when the true identity of the benefactor is revealed, because Magwitch brings him back his criminal relations and throws him back to his growing up at the forge. Once again, this time at a more critical stage, Pip is hindered in his quest to become a gentleman.
From the start of his search into the ‘identity of things’ the reader follows Pip’s progress as he moves through a world of confusing and conflicting signs. Part of the growing of drama in the novel is the way that Pip wilfully ‘ misreads’ clues to the origin of his expectations. Guilt and a sense of responsibility are permanently printed on the consciousness from the beginning and for most of the end narrative he seeks to contain them. He is in denial about his early, “ criminal,” past and finds it impossible to confess to Joe. When Magwitch eventually reveals himself as the source of Pip’s expectations, Pip’ shock is more powerful because we sense that the knowledge has been repressed but indistinctly known all along. It has been a necessary and essential part of Pip’s guilt-torn personality.
The true psychological effects of Miss Havisham are depicted early on in the novel, as Pip expresses his dissatisfaction of the class he is bound to: “and that I knew I was common, and that I wished I was not common” Despite being gaunt and decaying, through Estella Miss Havisham communicates her disapproval of a rough, course son of a blacksmith. When Pip visits Satis House he is, “common labouring boy,”. Henceforth the dominant purpose in his life will be to become a gentleman and win Estella. Money seems to buy him the status of gentleman, and when he is poised to leave the forge, his new clothes bring respect from Pumblechook but not from those who love him. In time he learns the superficial habits of a gentleman, but does not behave in such a manner when Joe visits him in London. Dickens shows us that the life of a “brought-up London gentleman” can be idle and dissipated, corrupting Pip’s better instincts. This theme is pursued through Magwitch’s hatred of Compeyson, who is a gentleman in style but the source of so much evil in the novel. Pip makes his sufferings internal into a passive victimhood that expresses itself most strongly in his hopeless love for Estella. He faithfully follows Miss Havisham’s pain conflicting exhortations to give up, “your whole life and soul….- as I did”. Miss Havisham is a cringer who learns to become a beater and then, abjectly under Estella’s cold rejection, a pathetic cringer again, “She turned to face me for the first time since she had averted it, and, to my amazement, I may even add to my terror, dropped on her knees at my feet.”
Certain key images or repeated events weave their way through the text, gathering meaning and significance as they appear. Pip sympathises with the convict on the marshes when he eats like a famished dog in chapter 3, but not on his return in chapter 39. Estella treats Pip like, “a dog in disgrace” when she brings him his meal in chapter 8, but Herbert educates him in gentlemanly manners in a tactful way in chapter 22. Tainted Miss Havisham seems to anticipate being eaten with more delight than eating. Jaggers tells Pip he will never see her eat: “She wanders around in the night, and then she lays hand on such food as she takes”.
Despite Estella not being a “shadow parent” she plays a key role in Pip’s psychological development, as throughout her childhood she has been manipulated by the embittered Miss Havisham. In Chapter 8, Pip experiences subtle denial from Estella, but as time goes on, and his passion for her increases, he faces a direct snub in Chapter 38, “will you never take warning?” Pip deceives himself when he thinks Miss Havisham has exempted him from her revenge. All the evidence suggests otherwise, as Miss Havisham herself becomes a more pitiable character in Chapter 38. She, in turn, has fallen victim to her own creation and her love, desperate in its intensity, is rejected. Estella can make no exceptions to the lessons she has been taught. In Chapter 44, Estella’s news or engagement to Drummle signals the final collapse of all Pip’s ‘expectations’. She calls him a ‘visionary boy’ and his investment in an idealised vision of her as a completion of his own identity, although moving, suggests an adolescent infatuation that is doomed to failure. It is a measure of his gathering moral strength and growing maturity, however, that even at this time he can think of Herbert before himself. Miss Havisham, herself a shadow parent, exacts a powerful influence revolving around love and passion through Estella. Even at the beginning of the novel, we see Miss Havisham encouraging the timid Pip to admire her beauty.
Until Magwitch’s reappearance in Chapter 39, Pip consistently misreads the nature of the tale he is involved in. He believes that he is the changeling of fairly tale who is really of righteous birth. Miss Havisham is a fairy godmother, and Estella is an charmed princess imprisoned in Satis House. It seems it his destiny to rescue her, but the reality proves to be different, as Miss Havisham is the evil witch after all, and Estella a genuine ice-maiden.
In the final chapter, Pip returns once more from the scene of his childhood. Going to the churchyard with young Pip is almost a commemoration, as the older Pip has begun to give form and significance to his own life and he seems to see in Joe and Biddy’s children the hope of a better future denied by him and Estella. In this final chapter, Dickens attempts to bring these damaged children of the previous generation together in some kind of relationship, and the result is, at best, ambiguous. Estella says that they will “continue friends apart”. Will they marry or does the shadow warn of a subsequent parting? By phrasing the last sentence in such away, Dickens intends us to remain uncertain regarding the future. In a way, Pip’s shadow parents have torn him away from Estella: Miss Havisham has manipulated Estella in such a way she feels obliged to inflict pain on the entire male race, where as one could say Magwitch’s poor, criminal background has distanced Pip from Estella’s radiance.
In conclusion, Magwitch and Miss Havisham exact definite psychological, even physical, influences on Pip, both acting as his, “shadow parents”. Although to some extent Jaggers, Joe and Mrs Joe are, “shadow parents,” the characters of Magwitch and Miss Havisham are particularly significant in Pip’s development. They seem to reverse their supposed roles in Great Expectations, and although there are omens and hints of change, the reader expects Magwitch to maintain his criminal, violent attributes, and return to menace Pip, and Miss Havisham to be his saviour and helper in his quest to become a gentleman. In a journal format, Dickens needed to employ many plot twists, as Magwitch turns out to be the mysterious benefactor, and Miss Havisham the manipulative monster who psychologically hurts and confuses Pip in so many ways. It is difficult to say who is the “best” shadow parent, because although Magwitch supplies the money which sees Pip through becoming a gentleman, in his own mind Pip is motivated by Miss Havisham and has visions of achieving great wealth and wedding Estella. If we look at the novel in hindsight, we can conclude that Magwitch is the superior “shadow parent” as he is clearly dedicated to helping Pip, where as Miss Havisham does nothing but psychologically twist him.
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