Examine how dickens' description of character and setting contribute to the creation of the mood in three different points in the novel Great Expectations

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Great expectations.

In this piece of coursework I am going to examine how dickens’ description of character and setting contribute to the creation of the mood in three different points in the novel. I am going to explain three important chapters that shape the play, Firstly I will be looking at the opening graveyard scene where Pip meets Magwitch, this is very important as it shapes his future. The second chapter I will be looking at is Chapter Eight at Miss Havishams house, where Pip meets Estella and begins to fall in love with her. And finally Chapter Twenty-Five at Wemmicks house where Pip learns how to become a Gentleman.

Firstly I am going to look at the graveyard scene. This chapter is where we first see evidence of Dickens’ gothic style. The graveyard was a “bleak place overgrown with nettles” referring to the church and the graveyard. This gothic style fits in very well with this chapter as Dickens has set the scene in a graveyard next to a church. This, together with the overgrown nettles and neglected grass makes the graveyard quite an eerie place to be. The area beyond the graveyard is described as “dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard”. This description suggests that Pip could see for miles along the marshland and could also see if there was anybody else around. The fact that Pip is supposedly alone in the graveyard also adds an element of eeriness to the chapter. Dickens uses alliteration to describe the horizon as a “low leaden line” here he is using alliteration to refer to the horizon and by using the word “leaden” he is describing how dark, grey and heavy the horizon is.

When we meet the convict he is made to seem frightening to the “small bundle of shivers” which is Pip. Dickens describes the convicts appearance, words and actions as terrifying. He is a “fearful man, all in coarse grey”. The colour he is wearing, a coarse grey, makes the convict appear dark and mysterious with a side of danger. However he also appears to have suffered a great deal and we see this later in the sentence where it says “ a man with no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied around his head. A man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and stung by nettles, and torn by briars; who limped, and shivered, and glared, and growled;” this allows us to create a picture of what this man looks like, as a rough, dirty man who has obviously been running from something. Also this mans desperation is shown when Dickens uses repetition of the word “and”. When the man says “Your heart and your liver shall be tore out, roasted, and ate” must have petrified Pip as it takes away all of his human qualities and focuses on his fear. Despite all of these things, we are made to feel sorry for the convict. Dickens uses the phrases “he hugged his shuddering body” and “picking away with his sore feet among the great stones” and “limping on toward this latter”. All these phrases show us that he is a desperate man and make us feel some sorrow for him.

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Later in the novel, Dickens describes Pips visit to Miss Havishams house. Here, the mood created is very different from the opening of the novel. It is more one of depression and great sadness. Miss Havishams garden is very neglected and is overgrown with brambles and nettles and there is also poison ivy growing up the side of the house. Not only is her house neglected and abandoned, she also takes no care of herself. Miss Havisham had “shrunk to skin and bone”. This tells us that she hasn’t cared for herself properly as she is wearing clothes that ...

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