Dickens immediately projects an image of Pip in the first chapter as little, cold and very much defenceless against an intense description of the setting around him. The reader would gain a substantial amount of knowledge about Pip from this; Dickens hints at Pip’s emotional state here, hinting at his feelings of fear, mourn, and background and social status. In a cemetery, a “bleak place overgrown with nettles”, the sky a “row of long angry red lines and dense black lines intermixed”, the wind rushing from a “distant savage lair”. Dickens describes Pip against the setting as a “small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all”, almost certainly giving the reader the image of a small, helpless child. During his visit to the cemetery a crucial incident occurs, involving Pip being victimised by a scary and intimidating escaped convict. This scene not only creates a sense of sympathy and concern towards Pip, but also establishes Pip as warm-hearted and considerate even towards a frightful convict who threatens a child that he would “eat his heart and liver out”; Pip, though terrified at the mere presence of the frightening man, remains courteous and even concerned about the convict – bringing him the file and wittles as promised without raising the alarm. This evidently displays how vulnerable and defenceless Pip is, and gives us awareness of the social conditions he is in. Before the run-in with the convict, he dwells upon his long deceased parents and brothers, “before the days of photographs” – suggesting that he has learned to live without his parents. Furthermore, the lack of knowledge about his parents and not to mention his knowledge in general is emphasised when he resolves that the appearance of his parents was determined by observing the style and shape of letters on their tombstones. He envisaged his father to have been a “square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair”, and his mother to have been “freckled and sickly”. As if this obvious message wasn’t being conveyed strongly enough, Pip interpreted his mother’s name to have been “Also Georgiana” where on the tombstone it precedes “Philip Pirrip, late of this parish….Also Georgiana, wife of the above.” Plainly, these are all attributes of a typical bildungsroman; an insight on the protagonist’s education and ancestry in detail – but more importantly, Dickens uses the qualities of this genre to establish Pip’s identity.
Proceeding on to the second chapter, Pip’s home life is the main subject here. It appears that the Gargery residence is quite evidently dominated by the hostility of Mrs Joe Gargery; after toiling around the village to find Pip she quite excessively reminds him of who “brought him up by hand”. Mrs Joe also has the same level of power over Joe as she has over Pip; essentially meaning that she treats Joe with the same disciplinary tactics she treats Pip with - further reinforcing the idea of authority that she holds. Pip and Joe are, to a certain extent, “in the same boat” in terms of utilising the same evasive action from “danger” around Mrs Joe. Both Joe and Pip have developed an intimate, affectionate and brotherly relationship as a result of “watching each other’s backs” such as during one of Mrs Joe’s “Ram-pages”.
Dickens has a distinct custom of using the setting to develop the image of the character or convey his character’s feelings – this happens when Pip returns to the marshes to give food to the convict in Chapter Three. For example, at the beginning of this chapter, throughout the first page, Pip is continuing with the story, but Dickens creates an eerie, tense atmosphere by describing the setting. Using words such as “rimy”, “damp”, “marshes”, “cold”, “spiders’ webs”, and using negative figures like “goblins” and “phantoms” conveys Pip’s feelings as he carries the burden of committing larceny, and running to potential danger, the frightening convict. Words such as “cold” and “phantom” create a sense of dread, eeriness and fear.
A while later in the novel, during Chapter Eight, Pip visits the truly mystifying Miss Havisham, a crucial character who plays possibly the biggest role in changing Pip’s life. It is in this chapter where a new realisation dawns in Pip, and he looks at his life in a new perspective, and not entirely in a positive light. Pip first meets Estella when he is admitted into Satis House, where Miss Havisham resides – and he immediately establishes her as “proud”, and of course, “beautiful”. A key revelation to the social status contrast is when the dignified Uncle Pumblechook is outranked and outgunned very easily by Estella when he politely asks permission to enter. Quite unmistakably, we can see from this incident how far the social status ranges from young Pip to a girl like Estella, never mind Miss Havisham! Dickens clearly establishes Pip’s place in society with this scene, and therefore expands on Pip’s identity.
Inside the unearthly manor house, Dickens again uses the atmosphere and setting to make known Pip’s feelings. For instance, phrases describing the wind; “the cold wind seemed to blow colder there, than outside the gate”, “shrill”, “howling”. “Dark passages”, lit by one candle – all create the sense of a small and frightened Pip, most likely reminding us of the first chapter in the cemetery near the marshes. One factor which accentuates the effect of which Dickens is trying to create is the first-person narration. Since Pip himself is narrating, we are able to increase our understanding of and sympathy for him; for example, when he first visits Satis House, he builds up tension by showing terror and fascination. Additionally, Dickens further highlights the difference in social status through the way Miss Havisham and Pip speak to each other, for example; Pip must obey Miss Havisham’s wishes, and dare not disobey or disrespect her no matter what the order – she tells him to play, and even as he does not know what to do, he dare not refuse. She speaks to him with bluntness and openness, even saying her thoughts out loud, revealing to us the scale of superiority in status she has over Pip. Pip, however, as I have mentioned has to be careful not to show disrespect, and is mindful of the way he speaks, using his best English.
When Miss Havisham asks of Estella to simply play a game of cards with Pip, she retorts with, “a common-labouring boy?”, and says it in such a disgusted tone, as if Miss Havisham had no right to request her of it; and when she had no choice but to play, she concentrated quite a considerable amount of effort in taunting and tormenting Pip, taking advantage of every fault he made to look down and literally spray into his face, “stupid, clumsy labouring-boy,”.
By the time Pip has come to the depressing realisation that he is working-class, Miss Havisham’s surreptitious plan is already in motion. Pip has a sudden strong-willed yet stubborn yearning to contradict her mockery towards him and prove that he could be worthy of the company of Estella. His mindset regarding this was so passionate, his humble background was not even considered when making pivotal decisions; in fact it very much seemed as if he was eager to leave it. Using this, we can clearly distinguish the level of determination Pip has towards this ambition. You can see, beyond question, the idea of desire – linking to the characteristics of a Bildungsroman.
Proceeding from the idea of desire, I will further elucidate Pip’s dissatisfaction with his life and his longing to improve himself using Chapters Ten and Fourteen. We immediately get a sense of Pip’s haste to leave the “common” life when he asks Biddy to impart upon him all she knows, so make a start on becoming “uncommon”. A distinct change in Pip can be seen; he bears a hint of resemblance to Estella – he becomes increasingly haughty, proud, and arrogant – and even looks down on Biddy and Joe as if he pitied them, and as if he was higher in rank. There has also been a sharp change in the relationship between Pip and Joe – Pip no longer returns the affection which Joe projects unto him, and we would rather come to dislike Pip at this stage of the bildungsroman. During Chapter Fourteen, the narrator, the older Pip recollects and regrets his dissatisfaction with life, calling it “coarse and common”, the exact words which Estella used to describe him. At the beginning of the chapter he admits that it was “miserable to be ashamed of home,”. He realised that his “ungracious condition of mind” was his own fault, and he did not deny his feelings of remorse towards it. A good example of the older Pip becoming aware of his terrible personality change and view of Joe is expressed when he says, “I wanted to make Joe less ignorant and common, that he might be worthier of my society and less open to Estella’s reproach,”.
This contrite feeling he now has about his attitude at the time tells us about his opinion of his desire then – and how he probably still would have wanted to be a gentleman, and lived up to his “Great Expectations” but remained loyal and proud of his heritage and background, and not become egotistical and vain.
Leading to the education system; in Victorian times, education was quite rare and uncommon; most social classes were deprived of it, and only the most distinguished and rich could stand a chance in gaining a proper scholarship. For example, in the story, Pip relies mostly on Biddy to teach him the ways of life and literacy; Biddy herself not being well-educated at all and even more so than Joe. In Chapter Seven, Joe reveals that he had no schooling, and Pip derives that Joe’s education “was yet in its infancy,”. This suggests that Dickens’ attitude towards education was quite uninvolved (this could be partly to do with him not having proper schooling as well) and by using examples such as Joe and Biddy he illustrates how working-class, poor and even middle-class were divested of their education.
As I draw to an end to my assessment of young Pip through Volume I of the novel, I will review the comments I have made on the identity of Pip. As a narrator, the old Pip has thoroughly recollected, evaluated and accepted the changes throughout his life and meticulously developed our understanding of his feelings and character throughout. Dickens has portrayed his view of the Victorian system of education, and how only the noble and rich deserved education, not the middle and lower classes of society.
In the opening of “Great Expectations” I think Dickens attempted to achieve a near-perfect way of depicting and giving the reader the impression he intends them to of Pip. I think Dickens has been very successful in establishing Pip’s character, especially by employing his customary technique of using the setting and atmosphere to reinforce the image of Pip and his feelings.
