Sagar Gill 10V
Coursework – ‘Great Expectations’
The aim of this piece of coursework is to examine different characters of the Charles Dickens book ‘Great Expectations’ and how Dickens manages to create sympathy for the particular characters I have chosen. The characters that I have chosen to write about are Pip and Miss Havisham. I will be analysing extracts one and two and using these to prove certain points that I will be making.
‘Great Expectations’ is the story of Philip Pirrip, known as Pip, an orphan raised by his brutal sister and her gentle-natured husband, Joe Gargery. It follows the ups and downs of Pip’s love life from when he is a young, poor boy living near the Thames estuary to when he moves to London, where he hopes to become a successful ‘gentleman’. The story takes place in the early nineteenth century England and begins in a semi-rural setting. We first meet Pip as a very young, impressionable boy, and in the first chapter, he is visiting the graves of his family which he never knew. The film story starts off with a dull grey background where Pip runs to the graveyard in order to visit the graves of his family. This gives us a sense that Pip is alone and scared. When he arrives at the scene of the grave-yard we hear much creaking and blowing of wind, giving us a feeling that Pip may not be alone. Pip talks of his parents as he reads the worn gravestones. He draws up images of his family by looking at the handwriting styles on each of his family’s gravestones. This gives us a feeling of guilt and sorrow as Pip is an orphan, which is also related to other books by Dickens such as ‘Oliver Twist’. Pip is obviously very alone, apart from the fact that he is very close with Joe Gargery. When an escaped prisoner threatens Pip into stealing food from his home and giving it to him the next day, you feel sorry for Pip as you can see that he is not very confident, and that he is frightened easily. This may be because of the fact that he is also abused by his older sister who is married to Joe Gargery the Blacksmith. The man who threatens Pip tells him that he also escaped with a convict who is a murderer that will tear out his heart and liver. We can see that there is no information given to us by Magwitch the convict. On first impressions we think that Magwitch is an evil character that will do anything to get out of his current situation, but eventually we learn more about him as time moves on. The dialogue used in this scene shows us that both characters are low-status commoners. They use language which only they would understand such as ‘gibbets’ and ‘wittles’. Both characters have totally different attitudes toward each other. Pip feels great anxiety and fear towards Magwitch, while Magwitch only wishes to have food and water. We can see how Pip feels and thinks throughout this scene. This is a good idea as the scene is more widely described than if it were to be of a third person view. Both characters are not described in happier terms. They seem very glum and upset by the way they are described. Pip is wearing nothing but commoner’s clothes, which do not support him very well, leaving him open to all sorts of weather. Magwitch is a convict, so he obviously would not be wearing any type of special clothing, prisoner’s clothes would merely be rags. This also builds sympathy for Magwitch as he is a desperate convict.
