The other character, Mrs Rutter from “The Darkness Out There” again has a deceiving first impression. She is portrayed as a cuddly “dear old thing” that couldn’t do much harm, yet as you get further into the story you can tell there is much more to Mrs Rutter than meets the eyes. Her eyes are also described as “snapping and darting”, not something you’d expect from a friendly “cottage loaf of a woman”. Similarly, the settings help this false view of kindness. She lives in a cottage surrounded by “polleny summer grass that glinted in the sun”, not what you’d expect from the cold-hearted she turns out to be.
Magwitch’s appearance is a “fearful man”, due to the amount of travelling he has done and the fact he is a convict. This appearance is startling to Pip, and when Magwitch threatens Pip, “I’ll have your heart and liver out”, Pip instantly does what he says. We do not realise that Magwitch is acting this way out of desperation, and is not in nature cruel at this point in the story, we instantly judge him based on his fearful appearance, and his behaviour does not help improve this image. He also threatens Pip with an imaginary accomplice who “in comparison with.. I am an angel”, again to scare Pip into doing as he says and bringing “wittles”. The setting does not help this image, as he is in a derelict graveyard, again suggesting Magwitch is associated with fear and death. Later in the play Magwitch turns out to be the generous benefactor of Pip, and shows he has a real sympathy for children, although his first impressions contradict this.
Mrs Rutter, on the other hand, has a much more likeable appearance. She is described as a “cottage loaf of a woman”, suggesting kindliness and harmlessness. The first clue we have of her cruelness is the fact her eyes “snap and dart”, which makes us suspicious of her true character. It is then revealed to us later she is a cruel woman who watched a man die over two days because he was German, and her husband was killed in the War. She lets him suffer only because he is with “the enemy!” showing no remorse for her actions, calling it “Tit for tat”. The setting which is a cottage with “beribboned kittens” and “flowery biscuit tins” does not hint to us she is cruel, in fact they portray an artificial image that is not true.
In comparison, these two characters have one detail they both share. They both have false appearances which are exposed later on to us. Mrs Rutter turns out to be evil, and Magwitch turns out to be good. This shows to us how people are not always what they appear to be. “You can get people all wrong.” Their only similarity is their difference, we have our own presumptions about the characters before we can meet them, we stereotype. To conclude my essay, we have examined two characters, a very callous woman who we thought was a cuddly old lady, and a “fearful man” who turned out to be noble and kind. From this we learn that we have to look past appearance as we grow up. Children see people as what they look like, but adults should see past all this. We all have pre-conceptions – the “Darkness”, and we must overcome these “but everything is not as it appears, oh no.”
