How does Charles Dickens create characters that are both memorable and striking in the novel 'Great Expectations'?

Authors Avatar

How does Charles Dickens create characters that are both memorable and striking in the novel ‘Great Expectations’?

In ‘Great Expectations’ Charles Dickens shows his marvellous talent by creating archetypal characters that readers can genuinely sympathise with and relate to. With an intricate mix of dialogues, direct description, setting and atmosphere, Dickens fashions characters that are striking and memorable. He utilises the characters to a great effect in order to shed light on the Victorian class system, and his views on it.

Great Expectations is set in a period very different to ours, it is in the Victorian period. A period in which the class system was important. The class system ‘refers to the ranking of people into a hierarchy within a culture’ (Wikipedia). There was a large contrast in those times, between those at the top, the rich, and those at the bottom, the poor. In real life, it was widely known that Dickens did not like the rich and the power that they wielded over others. This is why he portrays the rich in a bad light and the poor in a good light. This is a habit of Dickens’ that he uses in other books as well, for example, Oliver Twist. Again, Dickens’ uses the same method in this book, by outlining the changes in Pip’s attitude when he goes from being ‘common’ to a ‘gentlemen’.  This makes the characters memorable and striking to the reader as Dickens uses a stereotypical approach, the evil rich person versus good poor hero.

Great Expectations presents the reader with the development and growth of a character by the name of Phillip Pirrip, or Pip. He is by far the most important character. It seems that there really are two Pips in the book; he is both the protagonist, whose actions make up the main plot of the novel, and the narrator, whose thoughts, actions and reaction help change the readers’ perspective and judgement. In other words, they see everything through the eyes of this ‘common boy’ which makes the reader relate to him thus making him more striking and memorable.

Dickens carefully separates the two Pips in the story; one tells his story and the other provides the readers with insight about what is actually happening to him and how he feels about it. This is best seen right at the start of the book with the quote “Who gave up trying to get a living exceedingly early in that universal struggle…” This quote is sarcastic and uses words such as ‘universal’ and ‘exceedingly’, words that would not normally be used by a small child. This suggests that there may be an older, more intelligent and more arrogant Phillip that is giving his forthright views on the point about his siblings. This subtle change is persona makes both Pips more striking as the readers are not just reading the story from one point of view. They are reading it from two points of view. This gives them a better view of the situations that occur as the narrators are relating to them. This makes the two Pips more striking and it also plants a seed of doubt about Pip’s attitude when he is older in the readers’ minds. These quotes are in vast contrast with the simple trains of thought that comes out of Pip in the first paragraph such as “…the shape of the letters on my father’s (gravestone), gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair.” Comparing this quote with the one at the start of the paragraph shows the difference between the two Pips. It shows how money and class may have damaged young Pip’s kind nature and turned him into a sarcastic, arrogant person who did not really appreciate everything he was given when he was a ‘common boy’. This contrast serves two purposes (this contrast is only one example, more of these contrasted will also be mentioned later on in the essay). Firstly, we are given Dickens’ view on how money can change a person and how the rich people are always so ‘evil’. Secondly, we see glimpses of the stereotypical battle between evil people and good poor people. This battle, however, is not between two different characters, but two different personas of the same person.  This contrast between the same person’s two different mindsets makes them unforgettable as the readers are greatly intrigued by it.

Join now!

We also feel sympathy for Pip when we are told what his current condition is. We find out that his parents have died along with his five little brothers. Also, When Magwitch threatens him, even though he is very scared, he still replies in a polite manner by continuously addressing him as “sir”. This politeness in his dialogue makes the reader sympathise with him, making him more memorable.

Dickens also uses the setting to great effect. At the start of the book, he places Pip in a graveyard which is later described as a ‘bleak place’ that is ‘riddled ...

This is a preview of the whole essay