At first when Pip arrives at Miss Havisham’s rotting mansion, he noticed it is old and decaying. It is called the Satis house. Satis means enough. This is a good example of Dickens use of language because his choice of the name for her house is ironic because she is not living a life of luxury, even though she is a wealthy woman. Pips first impression of Estella is that she is very pretty and seems to be very proud. Pip realizes that Estella always calls him “boy”, with a carelessness that was far form complimentary, even though she was about his own age. But that is the way that Miss Havisham has bought Estella up, to strike terror into men’s hearts. By this time we can get a slight idea of the theme of revenge. When Pip first meets Miss Havisham his impressions are that Miss Havisham is probably the strangest woman he has ever seen, or will ever see. Looking around the room Pip soon realizes that everything in his view had once been white, but now was a decaying mass of yellow. “I saw that everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long ago, and had lost its lustre, and was fades and yellow.” However he realizes even though Miss Havisham just sits there she is still very alert. “I saw that the bride within the bridal dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and had no brightness left but the brightness of her shrunken eyes.” The brightness in her shrunken eyes suggests that she is very alert and on-the-ball. She knows what is going on a round her.
Miss Havisham tests her wish of Estella breaking men’s hearts and showing no distress out on Pip when she asks him and Estella to play cards. She says one word. “Play.” By doing t ens is showing how imperious Miss Havisham is. He uses imperative tense, an order or command. This use of language shows the differences in class between her and Pip. She wants Pip to call Estella so she says “So new to him, so old to me; so strange to him, so familiar to me; so melancholy to the both of us! Call Estella.” Again the imperative tense. It that quotation, Dickens use of language shows the different views of Pip and Miss Havisham. The brief interchanges between Miss Havisham and Pip when he and Estella are playing shows the way Miss Havisham has bought Estella up and the effect Estella has on men:
“What do you think of her?” asks Miss Havisham.
“I don’t like to say.”
“Tell me in my ear.”
“I think she is very proud.
“Anything else?”
“I think she is very insulting.”
“Anything else?”
“I think I should like to go home.”
“And never she her again, though she is so pretty?”
“I am not sure that I shouldn’t like to see her again, but I should like to go home now.”
These inter changes between Miss Havisham and Pip show that Miss Havisham knows that her wish is coming true. This is the theme of revenge, as Miss Havisham was abandoned on her wedding day, which was also her birthday. So she has bought Estella up in such a way that she would break any men’s heart. I think Miss Havisham is to be despised for this because this could also have an effect on Estella, she may fall in love one day, but seen as she is taught to show no emotions this could ruin her life, as well as all the innocent men. Also some people might say she is pitied because she was abandoned on her wedding day and therefore gave up on life. But I still think she could have gotten over it and started a new life.
Dickens uses a lot of certain techniques to get points across to reader and to describe things in a better way. Theses techniques include similes, personification, foreshadowing. Foreshadowing is used to give hints about things to come in later plot developments. It can be very broad and easily understood, or it may be complex use of symbols, that are then connected to later turns in the plot. Sometimes a writer may deliberately use false hints, called red herrings, to send readers or viewers off in the wrong direction. So basically foreshadowing is the use of hints or clues to suggest what will happen later in the story. Dickens also uses short sentences and vivid imagery. All these effects help to understand Miss Havisham in a better way and also help to decide if she is to be pitied or despised. An example of a simile would be: “…looked like grave-clothes, or the long veil so like a shroud.” That suggests that Miss Havisham’s clothes which were once white, were now yellow. There also repletion in the sentence to emphasise the fact of how long ago this happened. So you know Miss Havisham gave up on life a long time ago, which may make you feel sorry for her. Personification is used: “In a by-yard, there was a wilderness of empty casks, which had a certain sour remembrance of better days lingering about them…” This shows Miss Havisham’s house is slowly, decaying you could say, just like her. She has totally given up on life. She is a living ghost. Dickens uses foreshadowing heavily to drive the action of the plot. “When the ruin is complete, and when they lay me dead, in my brides dress on the brides table…” So now we know that maybe Miss Havisham will die and what will happen then?
Herbert Pocket, who is a relative of Miss Havisham’s, tell Pip about Miss Havishams early life. Miss Havisham used him by giving money to him, but giving more money to his half brother. “…he got great sums of money from her, and she induced her to buy her brother out of a share in the brewery (which had been weekly left him by his father) at an immense price, on the plea that when he was her husband he must hold and manage it all. You guardian at that time in Miss Havisham’s councils, and she was too haughty and too much in love, to be advised by anyone.” Herbert Pocket explained all this to Pip. He also told him that Miss Havisham stopped her clocks at twenty to nine, exactly when her life turned upside down. And since then her house has been a waste, and she has never looked upon the light of day. Herbert also thinks it was planned out with her half brother. “But I have forgotten one thing. It has been supposed that the man to whom she gave her misplaced confidence, acted throughout in concert with her half-brother; that it was a conspiracy between them; and they shared the profit.” So there is a maybe bad side of Miss Havisham and we now get an idea that she is to be despised.
In conclusion I think Miss Havisham is to be despised for all the men’s heart she would have broken through Estella, and also she would have a huge effect on Estella in the future. She would be unable to show any emotion towards men. I also think Miss Havisham is to be pitied because she was abandoned on her wedding day, which was also her birthday, and she hasn’t recovered since then, her life is ruined. But revenge is not the answer. She could have gotten through it and started a whole new life.