Dickens used these experiences to provide the stories for his novels. However, his writing was always about more than just a story. He wrote to raise the awareness of social issues. The middle classes were scared of the emergent working class, who they saw as an unwashed and uneducated group of people. Dickens’ humanised them, people saw them as victims, not a threat. Suddenly, libraries, swimming pools, schools, hospitals, parks became available to all.
Dickens would hire a big hall and people would pay a little sum of money at the door. He would read his books aloud to people who couldn’t read. The audience of the day loved him and he became a popular writer. Everyone enjoyed his books; the middle classes celebrated the fact that they could change peoples live for the better, the working classes enjoyed the fact that Dickens’ spoke to them, not down to them. The result of this was that his books and reading tours became huge success (TV productions are still made to this day). He was popular in America as well as Britain.
Pip is the most important character in this extract. Dickens shows this through what he says and feels. Dickens makes him the first person narrator. We see everything through his eyes. The viewpoint is of a young boy. He starts off all happy but then subdued by Estella’s harsh comments. For example: “With this boy! Why, he is a common labouring-boy! ... What do you play boy?” We can see from these statements that Estella insults Pip. Common means nothing special, labouring means unskilled work, and “boy” implies that she is talking down to him.
Pip does not speak too much he always tries to keep his sentences short and polite. For example when Miss Havisham asked him what he felt about Estella he tried to be as polite as possible. “I think she is very proud … I think she is very pretty … I think she is very insulting… I think I should like to go home now”. We can see from these statements that he doesn’t want to say bad things about Estella so he avoids the subject and politely asks to go home. He is polite and aware of feelings.
Miss Havisham, a strange, eccentric old lady embittered by the desertion by her betrothed on what was supposed to have been their wedding day. Dickens shows her character through lots of description – clear pictures are drawn through words. We see the real her, when she speaks she is cold, calculating, cruel. For example: “well! you can break his heart” we can see here that Miss Havisham has no feelings. Dickens shows her eccentricity in the way her room/clothing stays the same. For example: “but I saw that everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long time ago, and had lost its lustre, and was faded and yellow... everything in the room had stopped, like the watch and the clock, a long time ago”. Dickens allows her to be commanding (in charge). For example: “I want diversion, and I have done with men and women, play… call Estella she repeated, flashing a look at me. You can do that. Call Estella. At the door…” We can see from these statements that Dickens allows Miss Havisham to be in charge.
Estella was always insulting Pip. The devices used to show what Estella is like as a character are the way she speaks and what she says. For example: “he calls the knaves, Jacks, this boy!” She always talks impolitely and in an unfriendly way to Pip. She’s only a little bit older than Pip but she treats him with contempt. She makes him aware of the class divide and how society is (people don’t like you if they think they are better than you). She talks about Pip as if he is not there. She does not speak to him directly, except to insult him! For example: “and what coarse hands he has. And what thick boots!” this is not a nice thing to say, she is very insulting and she is not aware of feelings.
In conclusion it can be seen that Dickens used dialogue description and the fact that everything is seen by a first person narrator (Pip). And he explored his characters in a broad way, this shows that he explored the devices available to him effectively, and giving different characters different roles to make the story to blend in properly.
The early Victorian England was a time when great social changes were sweeping the nation. Throughout England, the manners of upper class were very strict and conservative: gentlemen and ladies were expected to have thorough classical education and to behave appropriately in numerable social situations.
These conditions defined Dickens’s time, and they make themselves felt in almost every facet of ‘Great Expectations’. Pip’s sudden rise from country labourer to a city gentleman forces him to move from one social extreme to another while dealing with the strict rules and expectations that governed Victorian England. Ironically, this novel is about the desire of wealth and social advancement was written partially out of economic necessity. Dickens conceived of ‘Great Expectations’ as a means of restoring his publication fortunes.
The Queen Elizabeth School
