Visiting Mrs. Havisham is the first turning point in Pip’s childhood. Before the visit to Mrs. Havisham’s he thinks he life is good and similar to others. From this moment on in the novel Dickens’s makes Pip a very self-conscious character. There becomes an immense change in Pip’s happiness.
Whilst at Mrs. Havisham Pip meets a very vindictive, selfish girl called Estella. Estella knocks both Pips happiness and his self-consciousness. Estella treats Pip with no respect, calling him only “boy” throughout his visits. Pip wants to change his lifestyle. Estella makes Pip aware of his working class and her upper class and makes him see the difference “with this boy! Why he is a common labouring-boy!”. Whilst Estella and Pip are playing cards Estella become very critical of Pip “And what coarse hands he has. And thick Boots”. Dickens’ adds this insult into his novel to show the reader Pip is in the first stage of his dissatisfaction of hi horrible home, clothes and lack of opportunity. Estella is behaving similar to Mrs. Joe.
The reader all ready knows from Pip’s words at Mrs. Havisham’s that the trip has indeed effected Pip’s self-esteem. Dickens backs this up with another line from Pip. “That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me”. Pip still has no one to take his frustration out on that he has build up due to him having no one to talk to. Pip starts to blame Joe for his poor working class ways “but I wish you hadn’t taught me to call knaves at cards, Jacks” Pip is making Joe the scapegoat for all his frustration.
Pip’s attitude to life has drastically changed from the beginning of the novel. Pip is now ashamed of every aspect of his life “Now it was all coarse and common”. By this stage in the novel the reader should be full of sympathy for Pip. Pip is such a caring child that he dare not even tell his best friend Joe “ I never breathed a murmur to Joe”. Pip didn’t even hint at it. The metaphor of a road is used to describe Pip’s life “life lay stretched out before me” by Dickens. Here Dickens is enthuses to the reader that Pip’s future is already decided, but Pip wants to drastically change this.
Pip is now taking his next step in life; Pip wants to become a gentleman “I want to be a gentleman”. This is kept a secret though, with only Biddy knowing about his new feelings. He feels like he is the complete opposite of a gentleman, feeling he is “coarse and common”. Though Pip wants to become a gentleman he is unsure what a true gentleman acts like. Pip is yet to find out the qualities of a true gentleman. Dickens gives Pip this impossible dream and makes him torn between two opposite lifestyles. Pip now starts to have an obsession with his new goal. He becomes selfish and arrogant, he only thinks of his own needs and his “future goal”. Pip starts to assume everyone around him has the same goals as him, he has become superior.
To become a gentleman Pip feels he has to move to a more superior place, so he decided to leave for London. Pip does not think about the effects this will have on the people around him. It is an emotional departure for all involved. There are tears in Pip’s eyes and regret but still, he decided to go. The relationship Pip had with Joe has now disintegrated. Pip cannot even look Joe in the eye when he leaves for London. All he can do is say “Good-bye, O my dear, dear friend”, this shows at least Pip recognises some values of Joe.
Pip has now forgot about his family back home. He is now concentrating on his new ‘gentleman’ style life in London. Pip’s first impressions of London are not living up to his ‘great expectations’. The only thing Pip can see in front of him is a noisy, busy, dirty and dismal city. There is pigs dripping with blood and men ready to be hung on the streets. In London Pip stays with Herbert Pocket whom he met at Miss Havisham’s when he was a young boy. Herbert teaches Pip manners and how to live an upper class ‘gentleman’ style life.
After Pip has been staying in London for a while he receives a very formal letter from Biddy asking if Joe can visit “agreeable to be allowed to see you”. Pip didn’t really wish to see Joe, but he had no choice as he was “bound”, owing him a debt of gratitude. As the time approached for Joe arriving Pip was getting worried and would have “liked to run away”.
At the meeting between the two there was an awful amount of tension. Joe is being very formal “sir” and Pip is showing a lack of respect “interrupted pettishly”. Joe and Pip don’t get on like they did before at home, at the forge. The meeting doesn’t last long and ends on an uncomfortable note with Joe’s last words being “Im wrong out of the forge”.
As well as Pip’s expectations of London not being good, his personal expectations are also bad “ I lived ion a state of chronic uneasiness”. Pip feels guilt for the conceited and ungrateful way he has treated Biddy and Joe. This is the first sign that Pip may be becoming a gentleman. He wishes he could have changed what happened. Pip’ troubles and guilty feelings even come back to haunt him in the night “When I woke up in the night . . . with a weariness on my spirits” Pip’s bad conscious stays with his day and night.
Pip knows that his “lavish habits” are not what he’s been brought up to be like. From the second Pip was with the Pockets he left his old life in the honest “forge” behind to live his extravagant London lifestyle. Pip has now forgotten his past and is living a life of excess in London; he has neglected his values, and the values of others.
When Pip returns home to the forge it is clear he has failed to remember the values of other. Pip offers Biddy money “How are you going to live, Biddy? If you want any mo ” The old Pip from the forge knows Biddy would have never accepted the money because of her high moral values. Pip offers biddy the money out of guilt.
While Pip was visiting Joe and Biddy at the forge, he managed to offend both of them. Pip is again starting to think about himself and himself only. Pip was extremely pleases with himself when he spent a night at the forge “I felt that I had done rather a great thing”. It should have been natural for Pip to stay the night at the forge. Pip is becoming even more a very self-conceited character.
The next stage in the novel is a huge changing point in Pip’s life as he finds out a shocking revolution. This is that Magwitch is his mystery benefactor, not Mrs. Havisham. This turned Pip’s life upside down as he no longer has connections to his true love, Estella.
Pip is now sad and unhappy with a “dull sense of being alone”. He wished he never met Magwitch back when he was a child” O, that he has never come!”. Pip’s ‘great expectations’ have turned out completely wrong. He knows he has done wrong and can “never, never, never undo what I had done” this is Pip’s self-recrimination. Pip knows what he has done is now final.
Pip knows he is not worthy of Joe and Biddy with his “Worthless conduct”. Dickens’s uses clever imagery by “the fire was dead” to represent Pip’s expectations. This represents Pip’s angst. The weather is dark and gloomy. Pip has dark feelings; again Dickens uses the weather to reflect Pips Mood
Pips treatment is very unfair to Magwitch after all he has done for Pip. Pip has obviously forgotten his past as he complains about Magwitch's manners. But Magwitch is acting the same way as Pip did when he first arrived in London; Pip is being a hypocrite. He has forgot he was “coarse and common” just like Magwitch. Not only is Pip being rude and ungrateful to Magwitch, he has forgotten his manners, as he is desperate to know what crimes Magwitch has convicted.
Magwitch is extremely proud of Pip because he looks like a gentleman. What Magwitch doesn’t know though is that Pip does not act like a gentleman. Pip is repulsed and horrified by Magwitch even though Magwitch has spent years working his guts out for pip. Also Magwitch has put his life on the line coming back to visit Pip. If Magwitch is caught, he will be hung.
While in London Pip has not developed as a person, he has become conceited and snobbish. Pip needs to start to appreciate all the sacrifices of Magwitch. Pip also needs to make amend for his poor, bad treatment of Joe and Biddy. If Pip does make amends and start to appreciate Magwitch he will be on the road to becoming a gentleman and Pip does this.
Pip returns home to give Biddy a marriage proposal but he finds Joe getting married to her, so as a gentleman he walks away and doesn’t say a word. Pip, Biddy and Joe are now having relationships similar to those back in the early Pips childhood.
Pip now has one last thing to sort out which is a Estella. Pip meets Estella again when he comes back 11 years later from working abroad. By this time Pip has go over Estella and now longer wishes to marry her “has all gone by”.
Dickens choices to end the novel with “The evening mists were rising now, and is all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me, I saw the shadow of no parting from her”. There was no shadow because Pip has become a gentleman and is able to cope without Estella.
The ending of this novel written by Dickens is very ambiguous. I think Dickens did this to prove a point about Pip. Pip really didn’t deserve a happy ending because he had done wrong for too many years. Although even if Pip did end with Estella they still might not have been happy together. This would have been unrealistic.
Dickens created the character Pip in his novel for two reasons. The first being that dreams sadly cannot always come true. The second reason being that money is not the key to happiness.
By
Paul Allen 10c
