When Pip reaches London we see the first signs of nostalgia for the security of Joe's forge, "London was decidedly overrated" (174) everybody tried to make Pip feel at home by behaving in, what they thought to be, the same manner as people from the country, by providing strawberries and shaking hands when it was "out of the London fashion" (174). However, all this made Pip feel further from home until he realised who "Mr Pocket, Junior," really was and from then on time seemed to pass quickly as he began to settle into London. There are certainly parts of Pip that wished he had not left, and he feels guilty for having fun and putting "the poor old kitchen at home so far away", but, his expectations are far more important to him than his background and so he does not dwell on the matter for too long. At no point does Pip tell his companion, Herbert, that he missed Joe and the forge and more importantly at no point does he really think about returning home. The small matter of home sickness is not nearly as strong as Pip's desire for Estella and to gain her he must gain a lot more in the meantime: "money, status, prestige, everything that distinguishes him from having the "coarse hands" and "thick boots" of a blacksmith's boy." (Vergara). Pip's need for these things is so great that it overrides any sense he might have, he feels guilty for leaving Joe, but only for a minute ("Joe had brought the tears into my eyes; they had soon dried, God forgive me! Soon dried." 244). This idea that Pip's only sense of nostalgia was sprung out of guilt is a strong one in Great Expectations; Pip certainly shows guilt for leaving, and now ignoring, his past but that guilt is squashed, in the same way his nostalgia is, by his desire to become a gentleman.
He feels he will gain more by forgetting his past and ignoring the closest thing he has to a family, perhaps the fact that Joe is not actually his immediate family confuses him. The forge is not really his home, and it is certainly not where he would have chosen to grow up. Jerome Bump suggests that his family actually drove him away because "as "compensation" for his shame he soon identified himself with Estella's extraordinarily dysfunctional "family" and adopted her view of Joe and a stance of "vicious reticence" or lying" (Bump).
When Joe comes up to London and visits him, Pip is appalled by the idea because he is ashamed to be associated with him. Pip says that his feelings about Joe's visit were of "considerable disturbance, some mortification, and a keen sense of incongruity." (218). Awkwardness has built up between the two friends; Pip has literally stepped up a few classes from a blacksmith to a gentleman, and neither of them know how to act towards the other. This awkwardness works in two ways for Pip, firstly he is ashamed for Joe to see his recently decorated flat and his servant; he is aware of Joe's simple ways and is ashamed to show off his riches in front of a blacksmith. Secondly, and I think more importantly, he is ashamed to show Joe, and therefore his background, to any of his new acquaintances. As Joe is leaving, he tells Pip that he accepts the class division between them and that from then on he will only be met by Pip at the forge. Pip is so overcome by this that he goes after Joe but finds he is too late to catch up with him. He feels embarrassed of the way he has acted towards Joe and again his guilt brings up a longing for his old home, and his old friends; but, again, these feelings are soon suppressed as he continues in his expectations.
Joe has now left it entirely up to Pip whether they ever meet again, and for now Pip is not ready to do so and when he goes back to the country he sends "penitential codfish and a barrel of oysters to Joe (as reparation for not having gone myself)" (246). This leaves the reader wondering if there really was any intention of going himself. In fact Pip does not return to the forge until he receives news of his sister's death. He says his intentions are there, but, that is hard to believe because he has plenty of opportunity to go and he seems intent on wasting these opportunities by staying at the "Blue Boar", or by leaving early for appointments and coaches so as to avoid Pumblechook and ending up wondering aimlessly. Surely he could have just as easily avoided Pumblechook at the forge!
As I have said his guilt seems to bring about a sudden sense of nostalgia, Pip begins to feel that his character is "not all good", he already knew he should not be ignoring his past and those he used to love. However, it is not until after he has escorted Estella to Richmond for the first, time that he begins to admit that his expectations are having a psychological effect on him. His guilt forces him to think of home and the forge and when he looks into his fire in London he thinks, "there was no fire like the forge fire and the kitchen fire at home." (272). He still knows that his love for Estella is too strong to give her up and go back to the forge, but, he is certainly realising that being a gentleman does have its disadvantages. It is not until Magwitch reveals that he is his benefactor that Pip begins to admit the mistakes he has made, this is where it hits him that he should have never gone to Satis House and should have never left the forge. He realises everybody has been playing with the fact that he thought his benefactor to be Miss Havisham, that he is not destined to marry Estella and all the money he has been spending is from the convict he so dreaded. This is where the sense of nostalgia becomes "powerful", all his thoughts are of how to get out of the situation he has suddenly, and unexpectedly, found himself in. He begins to feel that the best way out would to disappear back to the forge; if it were not for Magwitch.
Pip definitely shows signs of nostalgia towards the end of the book but there are always circumstances, mainly Estella, and his childhood memories revisiting him, that stop him from returning. When in their company Pip realises how much he misses Joe and Biddy but each time they separate the fondness fades; this is shown perfectly when, after his sister's funeral, Pip promises to Biddy that he will visit the forge more often, but as "he sets off…the mist clears - to reveal…the emptiness of his promise." (Smith, 47). In the build up to his initial departure for London Pip shows more of a longing for the place than has shown for anywhere else in the book ("I could not divest myself of a misgiving that something might happen to London in the meanwhile, and that, when I got there it would be…clean gone." 146). This longing far over shadows the nostalgia for Joe Gargery's forge, Pip does miss Joe but I would not say he missed the life that went with him. There are times at which he regrets ever leaving the simple way of life that went with Joe and his forge but I do not agree with the fact that there is a "powerful" sense of nostalgia "for the social and moral certainties of Joe Gargery's forge".
I think any nostalgia felt was sprung out of guilt for denying his past in the hope of becoming a gentleman: "For Pip, his bed just has become "uneasy," and that uneasiness also comes from himself, as his own conscience bears down upon him for leaving Joe and Biddy to become a gentleman, and rejecting that sphere of life Joe and Biddy represent. Thus, in Pip's case, anxiety comes from giving into his desires instead of following down the most logical path for his training and status." (Lee). However, the most logical path is not always the preferred path: when Pip returns to the forge at the end of the book he finds it "offers nothing less than the reconstitution of the family as the medium of social and moral understanding." (Dickens, xvii). Before he left, however, this "understanding" was never there and so Pip would be hard pushed to miss it.
Word Count: 1,907.
Bibliography:
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. Penguin Group, 1996.
Fielding, K.J. Charles Dickens. 2nd ed. Western Printing Services, 1966.
Smith, T.W. Brodie's Notes on Charles Dickens's Great Expectations. 9th ed. Pan Books Ltd, 1990.
Electronic References:
Bump, Jerome. Family-Systems Theory and Great Expectations: A Conclusion.
17 December 2002. <>
Lee, Elizabeth. Struggling with the Passions. 17 December 2002.
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Vergara, M.B. Gender and Pip's fancy of social advancement. 17 December 2002.
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