Things begin to change the day of his first visit to Miss Havisham’s, when his obsession with Estella begins. He is awe-struck by her good looks even though she treats him with such inferiority. Due to her upbringing by man-hating Miss Havisham, Estella looks down on a boy of her same age, just because he is of a lower class than herself: “Don’t be ridiculous boy, I am not going in.” She treats him like a “stupid, clumsy labouring boy” and makes this clear by pointing out his “coarse hands and labouring boots.” Estella gives Pip a reason to question his situation and class, thus causing his desire for self-improvement. However, in the end of the novel he will have improved so much in both positive and negative ways, that he will end up right where he started at the beginning of the novel, only to have gone through a complete personality transformation.
Jagger’s offer seems very practical, appropriate and too good to miss when Pip is informed that he has a secret benefactor offering him the chance to go to London to become a gentleman. He is already convinced that Miss Havisham must be preparing him for a marriage to Estella by bringing him into great fortune. As soon as he accepts the offer, his arrogance appears constantly increasing as he feels that he no longer is a part of his loving family, Joe and Biddy. However, as long as Pip is an uneducated country boy, just barely literate, he has no hope of social advancement.
The older Pip has already lived through all of these experiences and has had much time to look back and reflect upon his past actions. Possibly events have taken place that have resolved situations that were left unresolved by the end of the novel. However, the older Pip can now look back on his past with a sense of reconciliation with the past, even in a slightly light hearted manner.
Upon his arrival in London, Pip is somewhat disappointed by the standards of living of the so called ‘gentleman.’ He wishes to gain property in a most materialistic manner and does so in an almost excessive way as the money he is using is not being earned by himself. He is using Magwitch, without yet realising it, at the same time that the convict is using him by turning him into something that he wanted to be himself, but unfortunately could never become.
The older Pip, looking back on his past brings introduces us to two characters in particular, as being his two sides of ‘gentleman status.’ The good side, Herbert, is a gentleman yet a good and humble one teaching Pip to fit into the upper class society in a very friendly and modest way thus making Pip improve without feeling bad about himself. This is very important for Pip as he has a very low opinion of himself, which is what causes him to always desire self-improvement no matter how much he has already improved. Then there is Bentley Drummle, who although he is wealthier and higher on the social class ladder, is coarse and cruel and everything that Herbert is not. Drummle is a very important lesson to the learning Pip as he gives him proof that it is not only economical superiority that counts in order to achieve happiness. Drummle just happens to be a member of the upper class as he inherited wealth, but Pip’s ‘forever the best of friend’ Joe is good and noble, working hard but still not well off.
The narrator Pip having already learnt his lessons, is looking back on what he has already learnt. His narration is a product of his character as it exists after the events of the story. The reader supposes that the whole novel was written years after the events took place, at a later single date. He looks back on his own life and past experiences, judging himself rather harshly and reflecting back on old mistakes. The language he uses is clearly not the same as that of the young uneducated Pip, but he still uses a more. He is an observer of the past, as the reader is. The older Pip looks back on his past with a sense of peace and tranquillity.
Relating Pip’s development to my own, I think that’s Pip’s development can be related to anyone else’s in the sense that we learn from our mistakes, and want too much. There is always something wished for that is unattainable. Pip is just never satisfied with what he already has and has to go searching for the untouchable. In my case, Pip’s moving to London could be related to my coming to England to the Purcell School to improve my chances of becoming a concert pianist, which is in a different way to Pip’s, self-improvement. A competitive feeling that I wasn’t good enough for the surroundings I was in at the time, having been surrounded by excellent classical musicians all my life triggered the feeling of wanting to improve myself musically. That is where my growing up differs from that of Pip in the way that I wanted to change my surroundings not by improving them but by improving myself so that I could go back to the old surroundings and feel more at home. Pip leaves his home in hope to become a completely different person not wanting to return to his home at all, being ashamed of it.
Pip wants too much, and ends up with nothing that he ever wished for. However, his ideas have developed and changed through experience. Everyone makes mistakes and commits prejudice, but the important thing is to learn from one’s mistakes, and that, Pip does. Great Expectations is often seen as one of Dickens more autobiographical novels, as he too came from a poor background and rose to a higher ‘Victorian gentleman’ status. He achieved his own Great Expectations but never found happiness. This is probably what triggered the main theme in Great Expectations that happiness comes from within and not material wealth. At the time that the novel was written, Dickens had to deal with personal problems such as the failure of his marriage and increasingly serious financial problems. He reflects his own life’s burdens through Pip in the novel.
Although Pip ends up at the same financial point that he was before his status transformation, he learns important lessons through time and mishaps. He learns to love Joe, Magwitch and Biddy for who they are, and realises that he does not need Estella for survival. But probably the most important lesson Pip learns in the novel, and perhaps the most important theme in Great Expectations, is that no external standard of value can replace the judgements of one's own conscience.
Bibliography:
-“Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens, Penguin Edition
-Internet Sources: mainly .com
