Pip only had 1 sister and lived with her alongside Joe Gargery. His best was Biddy, his childhood friend. We never saw Pip hardly talking to his sister that much but he did talk to her politely and helped along in the house. Maybe this was because her sister always bragged that she raised him and she spent her life on him only making him feel rather guilty. This must of persuaded him to be like this to her. His behaviour didn’t change that much around Mrs Joe Gargery but later on she did die on illness which must of made Pip really upset by this.
Pip and Joe got on very well with each other. They would often speak freely with each other. Before, Pip was thrilled to be Joe’s apprentice, but I think Satis House really affected his mind and what and how he spoke to others. “that I shall never forget you”. Joe really means something to Pip at the beginning. I think the politeness of Joe was a good influence for Pip to have around him.
But when he left for London, things changed. Pip receives a letter from Biddy, telling him that Joe is coming to visit him. Pip was not happy by this. “Let me confess […], not with great pleasure”. The word “confess” feels as if he is hiding his feelings from even himself and feels guilty about this. You can see the changes the class system has made into his mind, making him think bad things. Pip even began to think negative things about a person who he spent most of his life with. “I knew it was Joe by his clumsy manner of coming up the stairs”. Pip knows that it’s Joe approaching his door but instead of pointing out a normal thing which he would of normally of said before, he has disputably said a negative thing which again I blame the class system.
Another thing was that before Pip left, he hugged Joe and left but when they met they only shook hands which even Joe thought he changed a bit proving again the class system changing a person especially a youthful mind.
Pip treated Biddy very nicely and talked to her politely. These 2 were best friends since their childhood. We don’t see Biddy and Pip talk until Pip changes a bit and tells her about him wanting to become a gentleman. This was an important part because Biddy realises that Pip is changing and warns him not to go ahead of what he is planning. He takes into his head but then is overpowered by his will of Estella’s love. Pip gets a little angry at her too. “(I don’t know), I moodily answered”. The word moodily suggests he doesn’t like what she is suggesting to him and gets a little eager at her. “I am very sorry to see this in you. You are envious […], dissatisfied on the account of my rise in fortune and you cant help showing it”. He thinks that she is saying all this because she is jealous of him becoming richer but she is not and just wants the wellness of her dear friend. I think this changed the relationship between these 2 because Pip kept failing on the wrong side of what Biddy actually went. I think that Pip should of atleast been more emotional when he left because I think that he was too over excited in leaving. Too me, he was forgetting what was more important in life than status.
The only closest person around Pip who was the perfect and suited role model of a gentleman was dear Joe Gargery. He had the characteristics of what a gentleman would have without status though. I felt sorry for him from time to time because he deserved better but he was happy the way everything was. “I’m sorry to say, I’ve eaten your pie”. The convict admitted that he ate his pie and Joe replied, “god knows you’re welcome to it, […], we wouldn’t have you starved to death”. He was so sweet and kind to the convict that he thought of the positive thing which was not to let a human being as himself starve. The word “welcome” tells me that he is a kind, decent and acts like a gentleman would without boasting.
Dickens creates a character like Pip that treats people this way because I think that even Dickens wasn’t sure of what a gentleman was so to go through this change would make him see the audiences response of what they thought a gentleman was. I think this is quite an effective technique using the audience to see how they respond to these changes because it gives him an idea of what a gentleman is so then he can add it to his novel.
To me, Joe is a gentleman. The way he acts and the words he says to people is a way a gentleman would speak: politely, caring, sharing, and hard working especially when he wasn’t upset when the convict took his pie but was actually thankful for not letting himself starve which most people in this world would not do. He never really says anything bad to anyone that offends them or makes them upset. A gentleman is a person who stands out and to me; Joe stands out as a character.
Dickens portrays Joe to how Pip should be I think. I say this because when Pip becomes a gentleman, Joe was already one to everyone so I think he was setting an example. I think he’s just a good person because he just lives a simple, easy and nice life. It also could be by the fact that he was raised like this by his parents but I don’t know because the novel does not mention his background, just that he is married to Pip’s elder sister.
Joe is a gentleman. He is never rude to anyone and never got angry in the novel even once. The way he behaves which is quiet, polite, kind, sharing and caring is the ways you can tell he is a gentleman. Sometimes, I felt sorry for him that he didn’t get more because he deserves a lot more.
Joe views Pip as a hardworking and caring person. I say this because Joe knows it will take a long time and hard work for him to become a gentleman and he is caring because from time to time, he is concerned for everyone especially when he leaves.
Dickens shows us Joe’s feelings by his movement. When Joe went to visit Pip in London, he was so nervous that when his hat kept falling off, he immediately got up putting it back and then scuffled a bit and fell into his tea making Pip fairly angry. He also shows us by his face expressions. “His good honest face all glowing and shining”. This tells me that it is quite easy to tell how Joe is feeling and the word “honest” definitely tells me that even Pip knows that Joe is the true gentleman out of them two which is maybe why Pip sometimes thought he was jealous of him but it may have been the other way round.
I think that Joe is a wonderful character to have in the novel because he really sets an example how we people in most novels should me but more importantly in life.
Dickens has included Magwitch in this character to be a unique person in the novel and also one of the surprised events which he did. At the beginning, we see Magwitch as an escaped convict trying to get back to his life needing the help of young Pip. He gets caught and we don’t see him again. But he shows his true self being unselfish and kind by not mentioning that Pip helped him but him admitting that he broke in and stole some items from Joe.
We all then thought we wouldn’t see Magwitch again and that was the last time we saw him but we were wrong. Years after, Pip found out that he had a benefactor which he assumes straight away to be Ms. Havisham but he was mistaken. One day in London, he gets a visit from a stranger knowing all about him. He then reveals himself to be Magwitch the convict and he was the person who was his benefactor and Magwitch laughs about it and hugs him, but Pip was more shocked than happy; he almost seemed upset about it. He relates to being a gentleman because from time to time he is one.
After reading the whole novel, I thought Magwitch’s ambitions were for his daughter Estella because that is her only daughter and since he is far away from her, he would want to help her in every way possible. But because of meeting Pip in such a situation and Pip helping him despite not knowing who he was and what he was must have gone into Magwitch’s heart so he decided to pick Pip instead knowing he is a simple poor lad.
Magwitch behaves like a gentleman twice in the novel to me. The first one is when he is caught by the police and lies to them that he stole the items to help him escape, so that Pip would not get into trouble by his sister, Joe and the Police. He did this because I think that he felt sorry for a young boy like him to get involved in this matter and that the fact that he helped him made him feel even sorrier for him.
The second time was when he visited and called Pip “Master” as if he was his servant for what he did for him and the way he talked to him was very polite aswell
I think Dickens thinks of Magwitch as a reformed character who knows what he did before was wrong and has put the past behind him. He is a decent, caring and unselfish person deep down but may look like a rock on the outside. I think that he is part of a message to the readers telling us that class system has nothing to do with how people behave because has you can see, Magwitch, a convict helped out a person with his dreams by being unselfish.
Pip becomes more humble, repentant and realises what has happened was wrong and I think he gets a little more emotional aswell. I say this because he has learnt many things while in London. I think he mainly changed because of Ms Havisham, Magwitch and Joe. Before Ms Havisham died, she revealed the truth about everything and at last showed us and Pip that she does have a heart. When Magwitch got injured while trying to escape, Pip must of felt guilty about it and so then he tried to spend as much as time with him as possible. “”he was ready to listen to me, and it became the first duty of my life to say to him, and read to him, what I knew he ought to hear”. You can see now how more kinder Pip has gotten with his mind now. The main change came because of Joe. When he learnt that Pip was ill, he came to look after him which was noble of him and you wouldn’t expect less from him. He also paid for the fees when Pip was arrested which again was generous from Joe. Pip began to see what he did and said to Joe was wrong and that after all this happened, Joe still thought Pip as his best friend.
I do think this was Pip’s journey into manhood because he realised these mistakes and quickly changed everything and he learnt a lot. Dickens put him through a lot. Maybe this was because he was to show how life was like in the Victorian Times and how hard life is if you’re poor. I think it was a test for Pip to see how the real life is and to show us; the reader what can happen in life and maybe it’s a lesson for us to know what to do. But maybe he put Pip so much because Victorians were fascinated with orphanhood so he did a detailed novel of Pip’s life.
I think Dickens is suggesting that to be a gentleman does not require you to learn it but you must behave like it like Joe as example, but if you want to force to be it, then its hard.
In Victorian Times, social class was everything and this was how people were grouped and separated from each other; the rich away from the poor. Changing social class would be very difficult and especially for a young mind like Pip. You would have to understand that Pip was given money; a lot of money which he did not expect, so he wasn’t really sure how to deal with it and maybe that’s why him moving up social class was more harder for him than anyone else. Of course, women were also grouped a bit differently than men. When a woman married a man, she would have to take her husbands name which you can tell that back in those days it was sexism as men were thought to be more superior and women were just expected to stay home and look after the house and the kids. Women only had a few rights aswell in that time.
Dickens published this book and basically told a novel of what happened in those days. This was when the economy gave rise to a wealthy middle class which again may have been a reason why class systems occurred. Crimes and disease also occurred. Only men with power and property could vote excluding out poor men, poor women and even powerful women.
I think that Dickens’s view and the rest of society’s view were not the same. I think that Dickens’s view was to show that what social class systems can affect society but I reckon for the rest of society, it didn’t make a difference
I think that Great Expectations was a novel of a kind which I have never read before. It has everything a novel should need and I do think at the end, Dickens still is not sure by what a gentleman is as he does not really give us what it means but maybe it was a question for us.
