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=                         Great_Expectations                         =
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                            Introduction
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'Great Expectations' is the thirteenth novel by English author Charles
Dickens and his penultimate completed novel. The novel is a
bildungsroman and depicts the education of an orphan nicknamed Pip. It
is Dickens' second novel, after 'David Copperfield', to be fully
narrated in the first person. The novel was first published as a
serial in Dickens's weekly periodical 'All the Year Round', from 1
December 1860 to August 1861. In October 1861, Chapman & Hall
published the novel in three volumes.

The novel is set in Kent and London in the early to mid-19th century
and contains some of Dickens's most celebrated scenes, starting in a
graveyard, where the young Pip is accosted by the escaped convict Abel
Magwitch. 'Great Expectations' is full of extreme imagery--poverty,
prison ships, chains, and fights to the death--and features a
colourful cast of characters who have entered popular culture. These
include the eccentric Miss Havisham, the beautiful but cold Estella,
and Joe Gargery, the unsophisticated and kind blacksmith. Dickens's
themes include wealth and poverty, love and rejection, and the
eventual triumph of good over evil. 'Great Expectations', which is
popular with both readers and literary critics, has been translated
into many languages and adapted numerous times into various media.

The novel was very widely praised. Although Dickens's contemporary
Thomas Carlyle referred to it disparagingly as "that Pip nonsense", he
nevertheless reacted to each fresh instalment with "roars of
laughter". Later, George Bernard Shaw praised the novel, describing it
as "all of one piece and consistently truthful". During the serial
publication, Dickens was pleased with public response to 'Great
Expectations' and its sales; when he first conceived the plot, he
called it "a very fine, new and grotesque idea". In the 21st century,
the novel retains good standing among literary critics and in 2003 it
was ranked 17th in the BBC's The Big Read poll.


                            Plot summary
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The book includes three "stages" of Pip's expectations.


First stage
=============
Philip "Pip" Pirrip is a seven-year-old orphan who lives with his
hot-tempered older sister and her kindly blacksmith husband Joe
Gargery on the coastal marshes of Kent. On Christmas Eve 1812, Pip
visits the graves of his parents and siblings. There, he unexpectedly
encounters an escaped convict who threatens to kill him if he does not
bring back food and tools. Pip steals a file from among Joe's tools
and a pie and brandy meant for Christmas dinner, which he delivers to
the convict.

That evening, Pip's sister is about to look for the missing pie when
soldiers arrive and ask Joe to mend some shackles. Joe and Pip
accompany them into the marshes to recapture the convict, who is
fighting with another escaped convict with a scar on his face. The
first convict confesses to stealing food, clearing Pip.

A few years later, Miss Havisham, a wealthy and reclusive spinster who
lives in the dilapidated Satis House, still wearing her old wedding
dress after having been jilted at the altar, asks Mr Pumblechook, a
relative of the Gargerys, to find a boy to visit her. Pip visits Miss
Havisham and falls in love with Estella, her adopted daughter. Estella
is aloof and hostile to Pip, a trait encouraged by Miss Havisham.
During one visit, another boy invites Pip to a fist fight, where Pip
easily gains the upper hand. Estella watches and allows Pip to kiss
her afterwards. Pip visits Miss Havisham regularly until he is old
enough to learn a trade.

Joe accompanies Pip during the last visit to Miss Havisham, and she
gives Pip money to become an apprentice blacksmith. Joe's surly
assistant, Dolge Orlick, is envious of Pip and dislikes Mrs Joe.
Orlick complains when Joe says he needs to take Pip somewhere at
midday, thinking this is another sign of favouritism; Joe assures him
he can quit work for the day. When Pip and Joe are away from the
house, Joe's wife is brutally attacked, leaving her unable to speak or
work. When Pip sees a leg iron, the weapon used in the attack, he
becomes worried, believing it was the same leg iron he helped liberate
the convict from. Now bedridden, Mrs Joe cannot be as "rampaging"
towards Pip as before the attack. Pip's former schoolmate Biddy joins
the household to help with her care.

Four years into Pip's apprenticeship, Mr Jaggers, a lawyer, informs
him that he has been provided money from an anonymous patron, allowing
him to become a gentleman. Presuming Miss Havisham is his
benefactress, Pip visits her before leaving for London.


Second stage
==============
Pip's first experience with urban England is a shock, for London is
not the "soft white city" Pip imagined, but a place of heavy litter
and filth. Pip moves into Barnard's Inn with Herbert Pocket, the son
of his tutor, Matthew Pocket, who is Miss Havisham's cousin. Pip
realizes Herbert is the boy he fought with years ago. Herbert tells
Pip how Miss Havisham was defrauded and deserted by her fiancé. Pip
meets fellow pupils, Bentley Drummle, a brute of a man from a wealthy
noble family, and Startop, who is a more agreeable colleague. Jaggers
disburses the money Pip needs. During a visit, Pip meets Jaggers's
housekeeper, Molly, a former convict.

When Joe visits Pip at Barnard's Inn, Pip is ashamed to be seen with
him. Joe relays a message from Miss Havisham that Estella will be
visiting her. Pip returns there to meet Estella and is encouraged by
Miss Havisham, but he avoids visiting Joe. He is disquieted to see
that Orlick is now in service to Miss Havisham. He mentions his
misgivings to Jaggers, who promises Orlick's dismissal. In London, Pip
and Herbert exchange their romantic secrets: Pip adores Estella, and
Herbert is engaged to Clara. Pip meets Estella when she is sent to
Richmond to be introduced into society.

Pip and Herbert build up debts. Mrs Joe dies, and Pip returns to his
village for her funeral. Pip's income is fixed at £500 (500) per annum
when he comes of age at 21. With the help of Jaggers' clerk, John
Wemmick, Pip plans to help advance Herbert's prospects by anonymously
securing him a position with the shipbroker, Clarriker's. Pip takes
Estella to Satis House, where she and Miss Havisham quarrel over
Estella's coldness. In London, Drummle outrages Pip by proposing a
toast to Estella. Later, at an Assembly Ball in Richmond, Pip
witnesses Estella meeting Drummle and warns her about him; she replies
that she has no qualms about entrapping him.

A week after his 23rd birthday, Pip learns that his benefactor is the
convict he encountered in the churchyard, Abel Magwitch. He had been
transported to New South Wales after being captured. He has become
wealthy after gaining his freedom there, but he cannot return to
England on pain of death. However, he returns to see Pip, who was the
motivation for all his success.


Third stage
=============
A shocked Pip stops taking Magwitch's money, but devises a plan with
Herbert to help him escape from England. Magwitch shares his past with
Pip, and reveals that the escaped convict whom he fought in the
churchyard was Compeyson, the fraudster who had deserted Miss
Havisham.

Pip returns to Satis House to visit Estella and meets Drummle, who has
also come to see her and now has Orlick as his servant. Pip confronts
Miss Havisham for misleading him about his benefactor, but she says
she did it to annoy her relatives. Pip declares his love to Estella,
who coldly tells him she plans to marry Drummle. A heartbroken Pip
returns to London, where Wemmick warns him that Compeyson is looking
for him.

At Jaggers's house at dinner, Wemmick tells Pip how Jaggers acquired
his maidservant, Molly, rescuing her from the gallows when she was
accused of murder. A remorseful Miss Havisham tells Pip how she raised
Estella to be unfeeling and heartless to men ever since Jaggers
brought her to her as an infant with no information on her parentage.
She also tells Pip that Estella is now married. She gives Pip money to
pay for Herbert's position at Clarriker's and asks for his
forgiveness. As Pip is about to leave, Miss Havisham's dress catches
fire, and Pip injures himself in an unsuccessful attempt to save her.
Pip suspects that Estella is the daughter of Molly, the murderess, and
Magwitch, but Pip is discouraged by Jaggers from acting on his
suspicions.

A few days before Magwitch's planned escape from England, Pip is
tricked by an anonymous letter into going to a sluice-house near his
old home, where he is seized by Orlick, who intends to murder him; he
freely admits to having injured Pip's sister. As Pip is about to be
struck with a hammer, Herbert and Startop arrive and save him. The
three pick up Magwitch to row him to the steamboat for Hamburg, but
they are met by a police boat carrying Compeyson, who has offered to
identify Magwitch. Magwitch seizes Compeyson, and they fight in the
river. Seriously injured, Magwitch is taken by the police. Compeyson's
body is found later.

Aware that Magwitch's fortune will go to the Crown after his trial,
Pip visits a dying Magwitch in the prison hospital and tells him that
his daughter Estella is alive. Herbert, who is preparing to move to
Cairo, Egypt, to manage Clarriker's office, offers Pip a position
there. After Herbert's departure, Pip falls ill in his room and faces
arrest for debt. However, Joe nurses Pip back to health and pays off
the debts. After recovering, Pip returns to propose to Biddy, only to
find that she has married Joe. Pip apologises to Joe, vows to repay
him, and leaves for Cairo. There, he moves in with Herbert and Clara,
eventually advancing to become third in the company. Only then does
Herbert learn that Pip paid for his position in the firm.

After working for eleven years in Egypt, Pip returns to England and
visits Joe, Biddy, and their son, Pip Jr. Then, in the ruins of Satis
House, he meets the widowed Estella, who asks Pip to forgive her,
assuring him that her misfortune and her abusive marriage to Drummle
until his death have opened her heart. As Pip takes Estella's hand,
and they leave the moonlit ruins, he sees "no shadow of another
parting from her".


Pip and his family
====================
* Philip Pirrip, nicknamed Pip, is an orphan and the protagonist and
narrator of 'Great Expectations'. In his childhood, Pip dreamed of
becoming a blacksmith like his kind brother-in-law, Joe Gargery. At
Satis House, aged about 8, he meets and falls in love with Estella,
and tells Biddy that he wants to become a gentleman. As a result of
Magwitch's anonymous patronage, Pip lives in London after learning the
blacksmith trade and becomes a gentleman. Pip assumes his benefactor
is Miss Havisham; the discovery that his true benefactor is a convict
shocks him. Pip, at the end of the story, is united with Estella.
* Joe Gargery, Pip's brother-in-law, and his first father figure. He
is a blacksmith who is always kind to Pip and the only person with
whom Pip is always honest. Joe is disappointed when Pip decides to
leave his home to live in London to become a gentleman rather than be
a blacksmith in business with Joe. He is a strong man who bears the
shortcomings of those closest to him.
* Mrs Joe Gargery, Pip's hot-tempered adult sister, is more than 20
years older than Pip. She brings him up after their parents death. She
does the work of the household, but too often loses her temper and
beats her family. Orlick, her husband's journeyman, attacks her during
a botched burglary, and she is left disabled until her death.
* Mr Pumblechook, Joe Gargery's uncle, an officious bachelor and corn
merchant. While not knowing how to deal with a growing boy, he tells
Mrs Joe, as she is known, how noble she is to bring up Pip. As the
person who first connected Pip to Miss Havisham, he claims to have
been the original architect of Pip's expectations. Pip dislikes Mr
Pumblechook for his pompous, unfounded claims. When Pip stands up to
him in a public place, after those expectations are dashed, Mr
Pumblechook turns those listening to the conversation against Pip.


Miss Havisham and her family
==============================
* Miss Havisham, a wealthy spinster who takes Pip on as a companion
for herself and her adopted daughter, Estella. Havisham is a wealthy,
eccentric woman who has worn her wedding dress and one shoe since the
day that she was jilted at the altar by her fiancé. Her house is
unchanged as well. She hates all men and plots to wreak a twisted
revenge by teaching Estella to torment and spurn men, including Pip,
who loves her. Miss Havisham is later overcome with remorse for
ruining both Estella's and Pip's chances for happiness. Shortly after
confessing her plotting to Pip and begging for his forgiveness, she is
badly burned when her dress accidentally catches fire. In a later
chapter, Pip learns from Joe that she is dead.
* Estella, Miss Havisham's adopted daughter, whom Pip pursues. She is
a beautiful girl and grows more beautiful after her schooling in
France. Estella represents the life of wealth and culture for which
Pip strives. Since Miss Havisham has sabotaged Estella's ability to
love, Estella cannot return Pip's passion. She warns Pip of this
repeatedly, but he will not or cannot believe her. Estella does not
know that she is the daughter of Molly, Jaggers's housekeeper, and the
convict Abel Magwitch, given up for adoption to Miss Havisham after
her mother was arrested for murder. In marrying Bentley Drummle, she
rebels against Miss Havisham's plan to have her break a husband's
heart, as Drummle is not interested in Estella but simply in the
Havisham fortune.
* Matthew Pocket, Miss Havisham's cousin. He is the patriarch of the
Pocket family, but unlike her other relatives, he is not greedy for
Havisham's wealth. Matthew Pocket tutors young gentlemen, such as
Bentley Drummle, Startop, Pip, and his own son Herbert.
* Herbert Pocket, the son of Matthew Pocket, who was invited, like
Pip, to visit Miss Havisham, but she did not take to him. Pip first
meets Herbert as a "pale young gentleman" who challenges Pip to a
fistfight at Miss Havisham's house when both are children. He later
becomes Pip's friend, tutoring him in the "gentlemanly" arts and
sharing his rooms with Pip in London.
* Camilla, one of the sisters of Matthew Pocket, and therefore a
cousin of Miss Havisham, is an obsequious, detestable woman who is
intent on pleasing Miss Havisham to get her money.
*Cousin Raymond, a relative of Miss Havisham who is only interested in
her money. He is married to Camilla.
* Georgiana, a relative of Miss Havisham who is only interested in her
money. She is one of the many relatives who hang around Miss Havisham
"like flies" for her wealth.
* Sarah Pocket, the sister of Matthew Pocket, relative of Miss
Havisham. She is often at Satis House. She is described as "a dry,
brown corrugated old woman, with a small face that might have been
made out of walnut shells, and a large mouth like a cat's without the
whiskers".


From Pip's youth
==================
* Abel Magwitch, the convict, who escapes from a prison ship, whom Pip
treats kindly, and who becomes Pip's benefactor. Magwitch uses the
aliases "Provis" and "Mr. Campbell" when he returns to England from
exile in Australia. He is a lesser actor in crime with Compeyson, but
gains a longer sentence in an apparent application of justice by
social class.
* Mr and Mrs Hubble, simple folk who think they are more important
than they really are. They live in Pip's village.
* Mr Wopsle, clerk of the church in Pip's village. He later gives up
the church work and moves to London to pursue his ambition to be an
actor, adopting the stage name "Mr Waldengarver". He sees the other
convict in the audience of one of his performances, attended also by
Pip.
* Biddy, Wopsle's second cousin and near Pip's age; she teaches in the
evening school at her grandmother's home in Pip's village. Pip wants
to learn more, so he asks her to teach him all she can. After helping
Mrs Joe after the attack, Biddy opens her own school. A kind and
intelligent but poor young woman, she is, like Pip and Estella, an
orphan. She acts as Estella's foil. Orlick was attracted to her, but
she did not want his attentions. Pip ignores her affections for him as
he pursues Estella. Recovering from his own illness after the failed
attempt to get Magwitch out of England, Pip returns to claim Biddy as
his bride, arriving in the village just after she marries Joe Gargery.
Biddy and Joe later have two children, one named after Pip. In the
ending to the novel discarded by Dickens but revived by students of
the novel's development, Estella mistakes the boy as Pip's child.


Mr Jaggers and his circle
===========================
* Mr Jaggers, a prominent London lawyer who represents the interests
of diverse clients, both criminal and civil. He represents Pip's
benefactor and Miss Havisham as well. By the end of the story, his law
practice links many of the characters.
* John Wemmick, Jaggers's clerk, who is Pip's chief go-between with
Jaggers and looks after Pip in London. Wemmick lives with his father,
"The Aged Parent", in a small replica of a castle, complete with a
drawbridge and moat, in Walworth.
* Molly, Mr Jaggers's maidservant whom Jaggers saved from the gallows
for murder. She is revealed to be Magwitch's estranged wife and
Estella's mother.


Antagonists
=============
* Compeyson, a convict who escapes the prison ship after Magwitch, who
beats him up ashore. He is Magwitch's enemy. A professional swindler,
he was engaged to marry Miss Havisham, but he was in league with her
half-brother, Arthur Havisham, to defraud Miss Havisham of part of her
fortune. Later, he sets up Magwitch to take the fall for another
swindle. He works with the police when he learns Abel Magwitch is in
London, fearing Magwitch after their first escape years earlier. When
the police boat encounters the one carrying Magwitch, the two grapple,
and Compeyson drowns in the Thames.
* Arthur Havisham, younger half-brother of Miss Havisham, who plots
with Compeyson to swindle her.
* Dolge Orlick, journeyman blacksmith at Joe Gargery's forge. Strong,
rude, and sullen, he is as churlish as Joe is gentle and kind. He ends
up in a fistfight with Joe over Mrs Gargery's taunting, and Joe easily
defeats him. This sets in motion an escalating chain of events that
leads him secretly to assault Mrs Gargery and to try to kill her
brother Pip. The police ultimately arrest him for housebreaking into
Uncle Pumblechook's, where he is later jailed.
* Bentley Drummle, a coarse, unintelligent young man from a wealthy
noble family being "the next heir but one to a baronetcy". Pip meets
him at Mr Pocket's house, as Drummle is also to be trained in
gentlemanly skills. Drummle is hostile to Pip and everyone else. He is
a rival for Estella's attentions and eventually marries her and is
said to abuse her. He dies from an accident following his mistreatment
of a horse.


Other characters
==================
* Clara Barley, a very poor girl living with her gout ridden father.
She marries Herbert Pocket near the novel's end. She dislikes Pip at
first because of his spendthrift ways. After she marries Herbert, they
invite Pip to live with them.
* Miss Skiffins occasionally visits Wemmick's house and wears green
gloves. She changes those green gloves for white ones when she marries
Wemmick.
* Startop, like Bentley Drummle, is Pip's fellow student, but unlike
Drummle, he is kind. He assists Pip and Herbert in their efforts to
help Magwitch escape.


                        The creative process
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As Dickens began writing 'Great Expectations', he undertook a series
of hugely popular and remunerative reading tours. His domestic life
had, however, disintegrated in the late 1850s, and he had separated
from his wife, Catherine Dickens, and was having a secret affair with
the much younger Ellen Ternan. It has been suggested that the icy
teasing of the character Estella is based on Ellen Ternan's reluctance
to become Dickens's mistress.


Beginning
===========
In his 'Book of Memoranda', begun in 1855, Dickens wrote names for
possible characters: Magwitch, Provis, Clarriker, Compey, Pumblechook,
Orlick, Gargery, Wopsle, Skiffins, some of which became familiar in
'Great Expectations'. There is also a reference to a "knowing man", a
possible sketch of Bentley Drummle. Another evokes a house full of
"Toadies and Humbugs", foreshadowing the visitors to Satis House in
chapter 11. Margaret Cardwell discovered the "premonition" of 'Great
Expectations' from a 25 September 1855 letter from Dickens to W. H.
Wills, in which Dickens speaks of recycling an "odd idea" from the
Christmas special "A House to Let" and "the pivot round which my next
book shall revolve". The "odd idea" concerns an individual who
"retires to an old lonely house…resolved to shut out the world and
hold no communion with it".

In an 8 August 1860 letter to Thomas Carlyle, Dickens reported his
agitation whenever he prepared a new book. A month later, in a letter
to John Forster, Dickens announced that he had just had a new idea.


Publication in ''All the Year Round''
=======================================
Dickens was pleased with the idea, calling it "such a very fine, new
and grotesque idea" in a letter to Forster. He planned to write "a
little piece", a "grotesque tragi-comic conception", about a young
hero who befriends an escaped convict, who then makes a fortune in
Australia and anonymously bequeaths his property to the hero. In the
end, the hero loses the money because it is forfeited to the Crown. In
his biography of Dickens, Forster wrote that in the early idea "was
the germ of Pip and Magwitch, which at first he intended to make the
groundwork of a tale in the old twenty-number form". Dickens presented
the relationship between Pip and Magwitch pivotal to 'Great
Expectations' but without Miss Havisham, Estella, or other characters
he later created.

As the idea and Dickens's ambition grew, he began writing. However, in
September, the weekly 'All the Year Round' saw its sales fall, and its
flagship publication, 'A Day's Ride' by Charles Lever, lost favour
with the public. Dickens "called a council of war", and believed that
to save the situation, "the one thing to be done was for [him] to
strike in". The "very fine, new and grotesque idea" became the
magazine's new support: weeklies, five hundred pages, just over one
year (1860-1861), thirty-six episodes, starting 1 December. The
magazine continued to publish Lever's novel until its completion on 23
March 1861, but it became secondary to 'Great Expectations'.
Immediately, sales resumed, and critics responded positively, as
exemplified by 'The Times's' praise: "'Great Expectations' is not,
indeed, [Dickens's] best work, but it is to be ranked among his
happiest".

Dickens, whose health was not the best, felt "The planning from week
to week was unimaginably difficult" but persevered. He thought he had
found "a good name", decided to use the first person "throughout", and
thought the beginning was "excessively droll": "I have put a child and
a good-natured foolish man, in relations that seem to me very funny".
Four weekly episodes were "ground off the wheel" in October 1860, and
apart from one reference to the "bondage" of his heavy task, the
months passed without the anguished cries that usually accompanied the
writing of his novels. He did not even use the 'Number Plans' or
'Mems'; he had only a few notes on the characters' ages, the tide
ranges for chapter 54, and the draft of an ending. In late December,
Dickens wrote to Mary Boyle that "'Great Expectations' [is] a very
great success and universally liked".

Dickens gave six readings from 14 March to 18 April 1861, and in May,
Dickens took a few days' holiday in Dover. On the eve of his
departure, he took some friends and family members for a trip by boat
from Blackwall to Southend-on-Sea. Ostensibly for pleasure, the
mini-cruise was actually a working session for Dickens to examine the
banks of the river in preparation for the chapter devoted to
Magwitch's attempt to escape. Dickens then revised Herbert Pocket's
appearance, no doubt, asserts Margaret Cardwell, to look more like his
son Charley. On 11 June 1861, Dickens wrote to Macready that 'Great
Expectations' had been completed, and on 15 June, asked the editor to
prepare the novel for publication.


Revised ending
================
Following comments by Edward Bulwer-Lytton that the ending was too
sad, Dickens rewrote it before publication. The ending set aside by
Dickens has Pip, who is still single, briefly see Estella in London;
after becoming Bentley Drummle's widow, she has remarried. It appealed
to Dickens due to its originality: "[the] winding up will be away from
all such things as they conventionally go". Dickens revised the ending
for publication so that Pip meets Estella in the ruins of Satis House;
she is a widow, and he is single. His changes at the conclusion of the
novel did not quite end either with the final weekly part or the first
bound edition, because Dickens further changed the last sentence in
the amended 1868 version from "I could see the shadow of no parting
from her" to "I saw no shadow of another parting from her". As Pip
uses litotes, "no shadow of another parting", it is ambiguous whether
Pip and Estella marry or Pip remains single. Angus Calder, writing for
an edition in the Penguin English Library, believed the less definite
phrasing of the amended 1868 version perhaps hinted at a buried
meaning: 'at this happy moment, I did not see the shadow of our
subsequent parting looming over us.'

In a letter to Forster, Dickens explained his decision to alter the
draft ending: "You will be surprised to hear that I have changed the
end of 'Great Expectations' from and after Pip's return to Joe's ...
Bulwer, who has been, as I think you know, extraordinarily taken with
the book, strongly urged it upon me, after reading the proofs, and
supported his views with such good reasons that I have resolved to
make the change. I have put in as pretty a little piece of writing as
I could, and I have no doubt the story will be more acceptable through
the alteration".

This discussion between Dickens, Bulwer-Lytton, and Forster has
provided the basis for much discussion on Dickens's underlying views
for this famous novel. Earle Davis, in his 1963 study of Dickens,
wrote that "it would be an inadequate moral point to deny Pip any
reward after he had shown a growth of character," and that "Eleven
years might change Estella too". John Forster felt that the original
ending was "more consistent" and "more natural" but noted the new
ending's popularity. George Gissing called that revision "a strange
thing, indeed, to befall Dickens" and felt that 'Great Expectations'
would have been perfect had Dickens not altered the ending in
deference to Bulwer-Lytton.

In contrast, John Hillis-Miller stated that Dickens's personality was
so assertive that Bulwer-Lytton had little influence, and welcomed the
revision: "The mists of infatuation have cleared away, [Estella and
Pip] can be joined". Earl Davis notes that G. B. Shaw published the
novel in 1937 for 'The Limited Editions Club' with the first ending
and that 'The Rinehart Edition' of 1979 presents both endings.

George Orwell wrote, "Psychologically the latter part of 'Great
Expectations' is about the best thing Dickens ever did," but, like
John Forster and several early 20th century writers, including George
Bernard Shaw, felt that the original ending was more consistent with
the draft, as well as the natural working out of the tale. Modern
literary criticism is split over the matter.


In periodicals
================
Dickens and Wills co-owned 'All the Year Round', one 75%, the other
25%. Since Dickens was his own publisher, he did not require a
contract for his own works. Although intended for weekly publication,
'Great Expectations' was divided into nine monthly sections, with new
pagination for each. 'Harper's Weekly' published the novel from 24
November 1860 to 5 August 1861 in the US, and 'All the Year Round'
published it from 1 December 1860 to 3 August 1861 in the UK.
'Harper's' paid £1,000 (1000) for publication rights. Dickens welcomed
a contract with 'Tauchnitz,' 4 January 1861 for publication in English
for the European continent.

Publications in 'Harper's Weekly' were accompanied by forty
illustrations by John McLenan; however, this is the only Dickens work
published in 'All the Year Round' without illustrations.


Editions
==========
Robert L Patten identifies four American editions in 1861 and sees the
proliferation of publications in Europe and across the Atlantic as
"extraordinary testimony" to 'Great Expectations's' popularity.
Chapman and Hall published the first edition in three volumes in 1861,
five subsequent reprints between 6 July and 30 October, and a
one-volume edition in 1862. The "bargain" edition was published in
1862, the Library Edition in 1864, and the Charles Dickens edition in
1868. To this list, Paul Schlicke adds "two meticulous scholarly
editions", one Clarendon Press published in 1993 with an introduction
by Margaret Cardwell and another with an introduction by Edgar
Rosenberg, published by Norton in 1999. The novel was published with
one ending (visible in the four online editions listed in the External
links at the end of this article). In some 20th century editions, the
novel ends as originally published in 1867, and in an afterword, the
ending Dickens did not publish, along with a brief story of how a
friend persuaded him to a happier ending for Pip, is presented to the
reader (for example, 1987 audio edition by Recorded Books).

In 1862, Marcus Stone, son of Dickens's old friend, the painter Frank
Stone, was invited to create eight woodcuts for the Library Edition.
According to Paul Schlicke, these illustrations are mediocre yet were
included in the Charles Dickens edition, and Stone created
illustrations for Dickens's subsequent novel, 'Our Mutual Friend'.
Later, Henry Mathew Brock also illustrated 'Great Expectations' and a
1935 edition of 'A Christmas Carol', along with other artists, such as
John McLenan, F. A. Fraser, and Harry Furniss.


First edition publication schedule
====================================
!Part   !Date   !Chapters
1-5     1, 8, 15, 22, 29 December 1860  1-8
6-9     5, 12, 19, 26 January 1861      9-15
10-12   2, 9, 23 February 1861  16-21
13-17   2, 9, 16, 23, 30 March 1861     22-29
18-21   6, 13, 20, 27 April 1861        30-37
22-25   4, 11, 18, 25 May 1861  38-42
26-30   1, 8, 15, 22, 29 June 1861      43-52
31-34   6, 13, 20, 27 July 1861 53-57
35      3 August 1861   58-59


                             Reception
======================================================================
Robert L. Patten estimates that 'All the Year Round' sold 100,000
copies of 'Great Expectations' each week, and Mudie, the largest
circulating library, which purchased about 1,400 copies, stated that
at least 30 people read each copy. Aside from the dramatic plot, the
Dickensian humour also appealed to readers. Dickens wrote to Forster
in October 1860 that "You will not have to complain of the want of
humour as in the 'Tale of Two Cities'," an opinion Forster supports,
finding that "Dickens's humour, not less than his creative power, was
at its best in this book". Moreover, according to Paul Schlicke,
readers found the best of Dickens's older and newer writing styles.

Overall, 'Great Expectations' was widely praised, although not all
reviews were favourable; however, Margaret Oliphant's review,
published May 1862 in 'Blackwood's Magazine', vilified the novel.
Critics in the 19th and 20th centuries hailed it as one of Dickens's
greatest successes, although often for conflicting reasons: G. K.
Chesterton admired the novel's optimism; Edmund Wilson its pessimism;
Humphry House in 1941 emphasized its social context. In 1974, Jerome
H. Buckley saw it as a 'Bildungsroman', writing a chapter on Dickens
and two of his major protagonists (David Copperfield and Pip) in his
1974 book on the Bildungsroman in Victorian writing. John Hillis
Miller wrote in 1958 that Pip is the archetype of all Dickensian
heroes. In 1970, Q. D. Leavis suggested "How We Must Read 'Great
Expectations'". In 1984, Peter Brooks, in the wake of Jacques Derrida,
offered a deconstructionist reading. The most profound analyst,
according to Paul Schlicke, is probably Julian Moynahan, who, in a
1964 essay surveying the hero's guilt, made Orlick "Pip's double,
alter ego and dark mirror image". Schlicke also names Anny Sadrin's
extensive 1988 study as the "most distinguished".

In 2015, the BBC polled book critics outside the UK about novels by
British authors; they ranked 'Great Expectations' fourth on the list
of the 100 Greatest British Novels. Earlier, in its 2003 poll The Big
Read concerning the reading taste of the British public, 'Great
Expectations' was voted 17th out of the top 100 novels chosen by
survey participants.


                             Background
======================================================================
'Great Expectations's' single most obvious literary predecessor is
Dickens's earlier first-person protagonist-narrated 'David
Copperfield'. The two novels trace the psychological and moral
development of a young boy to maturity, his transition from a rural
environment to the London metropolis, the vicissitudes of his
emotional development, and the exhibition of his hopes and youthful
dreams and their metamorphosis, through a rich and complex
first-person narrative. Dickens was conscious of this similarity and,
before undertaking his new manuscript, reread 'David Copperfield' to
avoid repetition.

The two books both detail homecoming. Although 'David Copperfield' is
based on some of Dickens's personal experiences, 'Great Expectations'
provides, according to Paul Schlicke, "the more spiritual and intimate
autobiography". Details of where the novel is set are not given, but
according to John Forster, Dickens based Satis House on Restoration
House, which was near to where he lived in Rochester, Kent. "Satis
House" was the house where Rochester MP, Sir Richard Watts,
entertained Queen Elizabeth I. Furthermore, no specific time period is
given, but it is indicated in general terms by reference to older
coaches, the title "His Majesty" in reference to George III (1738 -
1820), and to the old London Bridge that existed prior to the
1824-1831 reconstruction.


The theme of homecoming reflects events in Dickens's life, several
years before the publication of 'Great Expectations'. In 1856, he
bought Gad's Hill Place in Higham, Kent, which he had dreamed of
living in as a child, and moved there from faraway London two years
later. In 1858, in a painful marriage breakdown, he separated from
Catherine Dickens, his wife of twenty-three years. The separation
alienated him from some of his closest friends, such as Mark Lemon. He
quarrelled with Bradbury and Evans, who had published his novels for
fifteen years. In early September 1860, in a field behind Gad's Hill,
Dickens burned almost all of his correspondence, sparing only letters
on business matters. He stopped publishing the weekly 'Household
Words' at the summit of its popularity and replaced it with 'All the
Year Round'.

'The Uncommercial Traveller', short stories, and other texts Dickens
began publishing in his new weekly in 1859 reflect his nostalgia, as
seen in "Dullborough Town" and "Nurses' Stories". According to Paul
Schlicke, "it is hardly surprising that the novel Dickens wrote at
this time was a return to roots, set in the part of England in which
he grew up, and in which he had recently resettled".

Margaret Cardwell draws attention to Chops the Dwarf from Dickens's
1858 Christmas story "Going into Society", who, as the future Pip
does, entertains the illusion of inheriting a fortune and becomes
disappointed upon achieving his social ambitions. In another vein,
Harry Stone thinks that Gothic and magical aspects of 'Great
Expectations' were partly inspired by Charles Mathews's 'At Home',
which was presented in detail in 'Household Words' and its monthly
supplement 'Household Narrative'. Stone also asserts that 'The Lazy
Tour of Two Idle Apprentices', written in collaboration with Wilkie
Collins after their walking tour of Cumberland during September 1857
and published in 'Household Words' from 3 to 31 October of the same
year, presents certain strange locations and a passionate love,
foreshadowing 'Great Expectations'.

Beyond its biographical and literary aspects, 'Great Expectations'
appears, according to Robin Gilmour, as "a representative fable of the
age". Dickens was aware that the novel "speaks" to a generation
applying, at most, the principle of "self help" which was believed to
have increased the order of daily life. That the hero Pip aspires to
improve, not through snobbery, but through the Victorian conviction of
education, social refinement, and materialism, was seen as a noble and
worthy goal. However, by tracing the origins of Pip's "great
expectations" to crime, deceit, and even banishment to the colonies,
Dickens unfavourably compares the new generation to the previous one
of Joe Gargery, which Dickens portrays as less sophisticated but
especially rooted in sound values, presenting an oblique criticism of
his time.


                             Structure
======================================================================
The narrative structure of 'Great Expectations' is influenced by the
fact that it was first published as weekly episodes in a periodical.
This required short chapters, centred on a single subject, and an
almost mathematical structure.


Chronology
============
Pip's story is told in three stages: his childhood and early youth in
Kent, where he dreams of rising above his humble station; his time in
London after receiving "great expectations"; and then finally his
disillusionment on discovering the source of his fortune, followed by
his slow realisation of the vanity of his false values. These three
stages are further divided into twelve parts of equal length. This
symmetry contributes to the impression of completion, which has often
been commented on. George Gissing, for example, when comparing Joe
Gargery and Dan'l Peggotty (from 'David Copperfield'), preferred the
former, because he is a stronger character, who lives "in a world, not
of melodrama, but of everyday cause and effect". G. B. Shaw also
commented on the novel's structure, describing it as "compactly
perfect", and Algernon Swinburne stated, "The defects in it are as
nearly imperceptible as spots on the sun or shadow on a sunlit sea". A
contributing factor is "the briskness of the narrative tone".


Narrative flow
================
Further, beyond the chronological sequences and the weaving of several
storylines into a tight plot, the sentimental setting and morality of
the characters also create a pattern. The narrative structure of
'Great Expectations' has two main elements: firstly, that of "foster
parents", Miss Havisham, Magwitch, and Joe, and secondly that of
"young people", Estella, Pip, and Biddy. There is a further organizing
element that can be labelled "Dangerous Lovers", which includes
Compeyson, Bentley Drummle and Orlick. Pip is the centre of this web
of love, rejection, and hatred. Dickens contrasts this "dangerous
love" with the relationship of Biddy and Joe, which grows from
friendship to marriage.

This is "the general frame of the novel". The term "love" is generic,
applying it to both Pip's true love for Estella and the feelings
Estella has for Drummle, which are based on a desire for social
advancement. Similarly, Estella rejects Magwitch because of her
contempt for everything that appears below what she believes to be her
social status.

'Great Expectations' has an unhappy ending, since most characters
suffer physically, psychologically, or both, or die--often
violently--while suffering. Happy resolutions remain elusive, while
hate thrives. The only happy ending is Biddy and Joe's marriage and
the birth of their two children, since the final reconciliations,
except that between Pip and Magwitch, do not alter the general order.
Though Pip extirpates the web of hatred, the first unpublished ending
denies him happiness, while Dickens's revised second ending, in the
published novel, leaves his future uncertain.


Orlick as Pip's double
========================
Julian Moynahan argues that the reader can better understand Pip's
personality through analysing his relationship with Orlick, the
criminal laborer who works at Joe Gargery's forge, than by looking at
his relationship with Magwitch.

Following Moynahan, David Trotter notes that Orlick is Pip's shadow.
Co-workers in the forge, both find themselves at Miss Havisham's,
where Pip enters and joins the company, while Orlick, attending the
door, stays out. Pip considers Biddy a sister; Orlick has other plans
for her; Pip is connected to Magwitch, Orlick to Magwitch's nemesis,
Compeyson. Orlick also aspires to "great expectations" and resents
Pip's ascension from the forge and the swamp to the glamour of Satis
House, from which Orlick is excluded, along with London's dazzling
society. Orlick is the cumbersome shadow Pip cannot remove.

Then comes Pip's punishment, with Orlick's savage attack on Mrs
Gargery. Thereafter, Orlick vanishes, only to reappear in chapter 53
in a symbolic act, when he lures Pip into a locked, abandoned building
in the marshes. Orlick has a score to settle before going on to the
ultimate act, murder. However, Pip hampers Orlick because of his
privileged status, while Orlick remains a slave of his condition,
solely responsible for Mrs Gargery's fate.

Dickens also uses Pip's upper-class counterpart, Bentley Drummle, "the
double of a double", according to Trotter, in a similar way. Like
Orlick, Drummle is powerful, swarthy, unintelligible, hot-blooded, and
lounges and lurks, biding his time. Estella rejects Pip for this rude,
uncouth, but well-born man, and ends Pip's hope. Finally, the lives of
both Orlick and Drummle end violently.


                           Point of view
======================================================================
Although the novel is written in first person, the reader knows--as an
essential prerequisite--that 'Great Expectations' is not an
autobiography but a novel, a work of fiction with plot and characters,
featuring a narrator-protagonist. In addition, Sylvère Monod notes
that the treatment of the autobiography differs from 'David
Copperfield', as 'Great Expectations' does not draw from events in
Dickens's life; "at most some traces of a broad psychological and
moral introspection can be found".

However, according to Paul Pickerel's analysis, Pip--as both narrator
and protagonist--recounts with hindsight the story of the young boy he
was, who did not know the world beyond a narrow geographic and
familial environment. The novel's direction emerges from the
confrontation between the two periods of time. At first, the novel
presents a mistreated orphan, repeating situations from 'Oliver Twist'
and 'David Copperfield', but the trope is quickly overtaken. The theme
manifests itself when Pip discovers the existence of a world beyond
the marsh, the forge, and the future Joe envisioned for him, the
decisive moment when Miss Havisham and Estella enter his life. This is
a red herring, as the decay of Satis House and the strange lady within
signal the fragility of an impasse. At this point, the reader knows
more than the protagonist, creating dramatic irony that confers a
superiority that the narrator shares.

It is not until Magwitch's return, a plot twist that unites loosely
connected plot elements and sets them into motion, that the
protagonist's point of view joins those of the narrator and the
reader. In this context of progressive revelation, the sensational
events at the novel's end serve to test the protagonist's point of
view. Thus proceeds, in the words of A. E. Dyson, "The Immolations of
Pip".


                               Style
======================================================================
Some of the narrative devices that Dickens uses are caricature, comic
speech mannerisms, intrigue, Gothic atmosphere, and a central
character who gradually changes. Earl Davis notes the close network of
the structure and balance of contrasts, and praises the first-person
narration for providing a simplicity that is appropriate for the story
while avoiding melodrama. Davis sees the symbolism attached to "great
expectations" as reinforcing the novel's impact.


Character ''leitmotiv''
=========================
Characters then become themes in themselves, almost a Wagnerian
'leitmotif', whose attitudes are repeated at each of their appearances
as a musical phrase signaling their entry. For example, Jaggers
constantly chews the same fingernail and washes his hands with scented
soap, Orlick lurches his huge body, and Matthew Pocket always pulls at
his hair. Seen by the narrator, their attitude is mechanical, like
that of an automaton: in the general scheme, the gesture betrays the
uneasiness of the unaccomplished or exasperated man, his betrayed
hope, his unsatisfied life. In this set, every character is orbited by
"satellite" characters. Wemmick is Jaggers's copy at work, but has
placed in Walworth a secret garden, a castle with a family of an
elderly father and a middle-aged fiancée, where he happily devours
buttered bread. Wopsle plays the role of a poor Pip, kind of
unsuccessful, but with his distraction, finally plays 'Hamlet' in
London, and Pumblechook does not hesitate to be the instrument of
Pip's fortunes, then the mentor of his resurrection.


Narrative technique
=====================
For Pip's redemption to be credible, Trotter writes, the words of the
main character must sound right. Christopher Ricks adds that Pip's
frankness induces empathy, dramatics are avoided, and his good actions
are more eloquent than words. Dickens's subtle narrative technique is
also shown when he has Pip confess that he arranged Herbert's
partnership with Clarriker, has Miss Havisham finally see the true
character of her cousin Matthew Pocket, and has Pip refuse the money
she offers him. To this end, the narrative method subtly changes
until, during the perilous journey down the Thames to remove Magwitch
in chapter 54, the narrative point-of-view shifts from first person to
the omniscient point of view. For the first time, Ricks writes, the
"I" ceases to be Pip's thoughts and switches to the other characters,
the focus, at once, turns outward, and this is mirrored in the imagery
of the black waters tormented waves and eddies, which heaves with an
anguish that encompasses the entire universe, the passengers, the
docks, the river, the night.


Romantic and symbolic realism
===============================
According to Paul Davis, while more realistic than its
autobiographical predecessor written when novels like George Eliot's
'Adam Bede' were in vogue, 'Great Expectations' is in many ways a
poetic work built around recurring symbolic images: the desolation of
the marshes; the twilight; the chains of the house, the past, the
painful memory; the fire; the hands that manipulate and control; the
distant stars of desire; the river connecting past, present and
future.


                               Genre
======================================================================
'Great Expectations' contains a variety of literary genres, including
the bildungsroman, gothic novel, crime novel, as well as comedy,
melodrama and satire; and it belongs--like 'Wuthering Heights' and the
novels of Walter Scott--to the romance rather than realist tradition
of the novel.


''Bildungsroman''
===================
Complex and multifaceted, 'Great Expectations' is a Victorian
'bildungsroman', or initiatory tale, which focuses on a protagonist
who matures over the course of the novel. 'Great Expectations'
describes Pip's initial frustration upon leaving home, followed by a
long and difficult period that is punctuated with conflicts between
his desires and the values of established order. During this time, he
re-evaluates his life and re-enters society on new foundations.

However, the novel differs from the two preceding
pseudo-autobiographies, 'David Copperfield' and 'Bleak House' (1852),
(though the latter is only partially narrated in first-person), in
that it also partakes of several sub-genres popular in Dickens's time.


Comic novel
=============
'Great Expectations' contains many comic scenes and eccentric
personalities, integral parts to both the plot and the theme. Among
the notable comic episodes are Pip's Christmas dinner in chapter 4,
Wopsle's 'Hamlet' performance in chapter 31, and Wemmick's marriage in
chapter 55. Many of the characters have eccentricities: Jaggers with
his punctilious lawyerly ways; the contrariness of his clerk, Wemmick,
at work advising Pip to invest in "portable property", while in
private living in a cottage converted into a castle; and the reclusive
Miss Havisham in her decaying mansion, wearing her tattered bridal
robes.


Crime fiction
===============
'Great Expectations' incorporates elements of the new genre of crime
fiction, which Dickens had already used in 'Oliver Twist' (1837), and
which was being developed by his friends Wilkie Collins and William
Harrison Ainsworth. With its scenes of convicts, prison ships, and
episodes of bloody violence, Dickens creates characters worthy of the
Newgate school of fiction.


Gothic novel
==============
'Great Expectations' contains elements of the Gothic genre, especially
Miss Havisham, the bride frozen in time, and the ruined Satis House
filled with weeds and spiders. Other characters linked to this genre
include the aristocratic Bentley Drummle, because of his extreme
cruelty; Pip himself, who spends his youth chasing a frozen beauty;
and the monstrous Orlick, who systematically attempts to murder his
employers. Then there is the fight to the death between Compeyson and
Magwitch, and the fire that ends up killing Miss Havisham, scenes
dominated by horror, suspense, and the sensational.


Silver-fork novel
===================
Elements of the silver-fork novel are found in the character of Miss
Havisham and her world, as well as Pip's illusions. This genre, which
flourished in the 1820s and 1830s, presents the flashy elegance and
aesthetic frivolities found in high society. In some respects, Dickens
conceived 'Great Expectations' as an anti silver fork novel, attacking
Charles Lever's novel 'A Day's Ride', publication of which began
January 1860, in 'Household Words'. This can be seen in the way that
Dickens satirises the pretensions and morals of Miss Havisham and her
sycophants, including the Pockets (except Matthew), and Uncle
Pumblechook.


Historical novel
==================
Though 'Great Expectations' is not obviously a historical novel,
Dickens does emphasise differences between the time that the novel is
set (-46) and when it was written (1860-1).

'Great Expectations' begins around 1812 (the year of Dickens's birth),
continues until around 1830-1835, and then jumps to around 1840-1845,
during which the Great Western Railway was built. Though readers today
will not notice this, Dickens uses various things to emphasise the
differences between 1861 and this earlier period. Among these
details--that contemporary readers would have recognised--are the one
pound note (in chapter 10) that the Bank Notes Act 1826 had removed
from circulation; likewise, the death penalty for deported felons who
returned to Britain was abolished in 1835. The gallows erected in the
swamps, designed to display a rotting corpse, had disappeared by 1832,
and George III, the monarch mentioned at the beginning, died in 1820,
when Pip would have been seven or eight.

Miss Havisham paid Joe 25 guineas, gold coins, when Pip was to begin
his apprenticeship (in chapter 13); guinea coins were slowly going out
of circulation after the last new ones were struck with the face of
George III in 1799. This also marks the historical period, as the
one-pound note was the official currency at the time of the novel's
publication. Dickens placed the epilogue 11 years after Magwitch's
death, which seems to be the time limit of the reported facts.
Collectively, the details suggest that Dickens identified with the
main character. If Pip is around 23 toward the middle of the novel and
34 at its end, he is roughly modeled after his creator, who turned 34
in 1846.


                               Themes
======================================================================
The title's "Expectations" refers to "a legacy to come", and thus
immediately announces that money, or more specifically wealth plays an
important part in the novel. Some other major themes are crime, social
class, including both gentility, and social alienation, imperialism,
and ambition. The novel is also concerned with questions relating to
conscience and moral regeneration, as well as redemption through love.


Pip's name
============
Dickens famously created comic and telling names for his characters,
but in 'Great Expectations' he goes further. The first sentence of the
novel establishes that Pip's proper name is Philip Pirrip--the wording
of his father's gravestone--which "my infant tongue could make of both
names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip". The name Philip
Pirrip (or Pirrip) is never used again in the novel. In Chapter 18,
when he receives his expectation from an anonymous benefactor, the
first condition attached to it is "that you always bear the name of
Pip".

In Chapter 22, when Pip establishes his friendship with Herbert
Pocket, he attempts to introduce himself as Philip. Herbert
immediately rejects the name: I don't take to Philip,' said he,
smiling, 'for it sounds like a moral boy out of the spelling-book and
decides to refer to Pip exclusively as Handel: Would you mind Handel
for a familiar name? There's a charming piece of music by Handel,
called the 'Harmonious Blacksmith''". The only other place he is
referred to as Philip is in Chapter 44, when he receives a letter
addressed to "Philip Pip" from his friend Wemmick, which says "DON'T
GO HOME".


Pip as social outcast
=======================
A central theme here is of people living as social outcasts. The
novel's opening setting emphasises this: the orphaned Pip lives in an
isolated foggy environment next to a graveyard, dangerous swamps, and
prison ships. Furthermore, "I was always treated as if I had insisted
on being born in opposition to the dictates of reason, religion and
morality".

Pip feels excluded by society, and this leads to his aggressive
attitude towards it, as he tries to win his place within it through
any means. Various other characters behave similarly--that is, the
oppressed become the oppressors. Jaggers dominates Wemmick, who in
turn dominates Jaggers's clients. Likewise, Magwitch uses Pip as an
instrument of vengeance, as Miss Havisham uses Estella.

However, Pip has hope despite his sense of exclusion because he is
convinced that divine providence owes him a place in society and that
marriage to Estella is his destiny. Therefore, when fortune comes his
way, Pip shows no surprise, because he believes that his value as a
human being and his inherent nobility have been recognized. Thus, Pip
accepts Pumblechook's flattery without blinking: "That boy is no
common boy" and the "May I? 'May' I?" associated with handshakes.

From Pip's hope comes his "uncontrollable, impossible love for
Estella", despite the humiliations to which she has subjected him. For
Pip, winning a place in society also means winning Estella's heart.


Wealth
========
When the money secretly provided by Magwitch enables Pip to enter
London society, two new related themes, wealth and gentility, are
introduced.


As the novel's title implies, money is a theme of 'Great
Expectations'. Central to this is the idea that wealth is only
acceptable to the ruling class if it comes from the labour of others.
Miss Havisham's wealth comes not from the sweat of her brow but from
rent collected on properties she inherited from her father, a brewer.
Her wealth is "pure", and her father's profession as a brewer does not
contaminate it. Herbert states in chapter 22 that "while you cannot
possibly be genteel and bake, you may be as genteel as never was and
brew". Because of her wealth, the old lady, despite her eccentricity,
enjoys public esteem. She remains in a constant business relationship
with her lawyer Jaggers and keeps a tight grip over her "court" of
sycophants, so that, far from representing social exclusion, she is
the very image of a powerful landed aristocracy that is frozen in the
past and "embalmed in its own pride".

On the other hand, Magwitch's wealth is socially unacceptable, firstly
because he earned it, not through the efforts of others, but through
his own hard work, and secondly because he was a convict, and he
earned it in a penal colony. It is argued that the contrast with Miss
Havisham's wealth is suggested symbolically. Thus Magwitch's money
smells of sweat, and his money is greasy and crumpled: "two fat
sweltering one-pound notes that seemed to have been on terms of the
warmest intimacy with all the cattle market in the country", while the
coins Miss Havisham gives for Pip's "indentures" shine as if new.
Further, it is argued Pip demonstrates his "good breeding, because
when he discovers that he owes his transformation into a "gentleman"
to such a contaminated windfall, he is repulsed. A. O. J. Cockshut,
however, has suggested that there is no difference between Magwitch's
wealth and that of Miss Havisham.

Trotter emphasizes the importance of Magwitch's greasy banknotes.
Beyond Pip's emotional reaction the notes reveal that Dickens's views
on social and economic progress changed in the years prior to the
publication of 'Great Expectations'. His novels and 'Household Words'
extensively reflect Dickens's views, and his efforts to contribute to
social progress expanded in the 1840s. To illustrate his point, he
cites Humphry House who, succinctly, writes that in 'Pickwick Papers',
"a bad smell was a bad smell", whereas in 'Our Mutual Friend' and
'Great Expectations', "it is a problem".

At the time of The Great Exhibition of 1851, Dickens and Richard Henry
Horne, an editor of 'Household Words', wrote an article comparing the
British technology that created the Crystal Palace to the few
artifacts exhibited by China: England represented an openness to
worldwide trade and China isolationism. "To compare China and England
is to compare Stoppage to Progress", they concluded. According to
Trotter, this was a way to target the Tory government's return to
protectionism, which they felt would make England the China of Europe.
In fact, 'Household Words' 17 May 1856 issue championed international
free trade, comparing the constant flow of money to the circulation of
the blood. In the 1850s, Dickens believed in "genuine" wealth, which
critic Trotter compares to fresh banknotes, crisp to the touch, pure
and odorless.

With 'Great Expectations' Dickens's views about wealth have changed.
However, though some sharp satire exists, no character in the novel
has the role of the moralist who condemns Pip and his society. In
fact, even Joe and Biddy themselves, paragons of good sense, are
complicit, through their exaggerated innate humility, in Pip's social
deviancy. Dickens's moral judgement is first made through the way that
he contrasts characters: only a few characters keep to the straight
and narrow path; Joe, whose values remain unchanged; Matthew Pocket
whose pride renders him, to his family's astonishment, unable to
flatter his rich relatives; Jaggers, who keeps a cool head and has no
illusions about his clients; Biddy, who overcomes her shyness to, from
time to time, bring order. The narrator-hero is left to draw the
necessary conclusions: in the end, Pip finds the light and embarks on
a path of moral regeneration.


London as prison
==================
In London, neither wealth nor gentility brings happiness. Pip, the
apprentice gentleman, constantly bemoans his anxiety, his feelings of
insecurity, and multiple allusions to overwhelming chronic unease, to
weariness, drown his enthusiasm (chapter 34). Wealth, in effect,
eludes his control: the more he spends, the deeper he goes into debt
to satisfy new needs, which were just as futile as his old ones.

His unusual path to gentility has the opposite effect to what he
expected: infinite opportunities become available, certainly, but will
power, in proportion, fades and paralyses the soul. In the crowded
metropolis, Pip grows disenchanted, disillusioned, and lonely.
Alienated from his native Kent, he has lost the support provided by
the village blacksmith. In London, he is powerless to join a
community, not the Pocket family, much less Jaggers's circle. London
has become Pip's prison and, like the convicts of his youth, he is
bound in chains: "no Satis House can be built merely with money".


Gentility
===========
The idea of "good breeding" and what makes for a "gentleman" other
than money, in other words, "gentility", is a central theme of 'Great
Expectations'. The convict Magwitch covets it by proxy through Pip;
Mrs Pocket dreams of acquiring it; it is also found in Pumblechook's
sycophancy; it is even seen in Joe, when he stammers between "Pip" and
"Sir" during his visit to London, and when Biddy's letters to Pip
suddenly become reverent.

There are other characters who are associated with the idea of
gentility, like, for example, Miss Havisham's seducer, Compeyson, the
scarred-face convict. While Compeyson is corrupt, even Magwitch does
not forget that he is a gentleman. This also includes Estella, who
ignores the fact that she is the daughter of Magwitch and another
criminal.

There are a couple of ways by which someone can acquire gentility, one
being a title, another being family ties to the upper middle class.
Mrs Pocket bases every aspiration on the fact that her grandfather
failed to be knighted, while Pip hopes that Miss Havisham will
eventually adopt him, as adoption, as evidenced by Estella, who
behaves like a born and bred little lady, is acceptable. But even more
important, though not sufficient, are wealth and education. Pip knows
that and endorses it, as he hears from Jaggers through Matthew Pocket:
"I was not designed for any profession, and I should be well enough
educated for my destiny if I could hold my own with the average of
young men in prosperous circumstances." But neither the educated
Matthew Pocket, nor Jaggers, who has earned his status solely through
his intellect, can aspire to gentility. Bentley Drummle, however,
embodies the social ideal, so that Estella marries him without
hesitation.


Moral regeneration
====================
Another theme of 'Great Expectations' is that Pip can undergo "moral
regeneration".

In chapter 39, the novel's turning point, Magwitch visits Pip to see
the gentleman he has become, and once the convict has hidden in
Herbert Pocket's room, Pip realises his situation:



To cope with his situation and his learning that he now needs
Magwitch, a hunted, injured man who traded his life for Pip's. Pip can
only rely on the power of love for Estella. Pip now goes through
several different stages, each of which is accompanied by successive
realisations about the vanity of the prior certainties.

Pip's problem is more psychological and moral than social. Pip's
climbing of the social ladder upon gaining wealth is followed by a
corresponding degradation of his integrity. Thus after his first visit
to Miss Havisham, the innocent young boy from the marshes, suddenly
turns into a liar to dazzle his sister, Mrs Joe, and his Uncle
Pumblechook with the tales of a carriage and veal chops. More
disturbing is his fascination with Satis House--where he is despised
and even slapped, beset by ghostly visions, rejected by the
Pockets--and the gradual growth of the mirage of London. The allure of
wealth overpowers loyalty and gratitude, even conscience itself. This
is evidenced by the urge to buy Joe's return, in chapter 27, Pip's
haughty glance as Joe deciphers the alphabet, not to mention the
condescending contempt he confesses to Biddy, copying Estella's
behaviour toward him.

Pip represents, as do those he mimics, the bankruptcy of the "idea of
the gentleman", and becomes the sole beneficiary of vulgarity,
inversely proportional to his mounting gentility. In chapter 30,
Dickens parodies the new disease that is corroding Pip's moral values
through the character "Trabb's boy", who is the only one not to be
fooled. The boy parades through the main street of the village with
boyish antics and contortions meant to satirically imitate Pip. The
gross, comic caricature openly exposes the hypocrisy of this 'new'
gentleman in a frock coat and top hat. Trabb's boy reveals that
appearance has taken precedence over being, protocol on feelings,
decorum on authenticity; labels reign to the point of absurdity, and
human solidarity is no longer the order of the day.

Estella and Miss Havisham represent rich people who enjoy a materially
easier life but cannot cope with a tougher reality. Miss Havisham,
like a melodramatic heroine, withdrew from life at the first sign of
hardship. Estella, excessively spoiled and pampered, sorely lacks
judgement and falls prey to the first gentleman who approaches her,
though he is the worst. Estella's marriage to such a brute
demonstrates the failure of her education. Estella is used to
dominating, but becomes a victim of her own vice, brought to her level
by a man born in her image.

Dickens uses imagery to reinforce his ideas and London, the paradise
of the rich and of the 'ideal' of the gentleman, has mounds of filth,
it is crooked, decrepit, and greasy, a dark desert of bricks, soot,
rain, and fog. The surviving vegetation is stunted, and confined to
fenced-off paths without air or light. Barnard's Inn, where Pip
lodges, offers mediocre food and service, while the rooms, despite the
furnishing provided, as Suhamy states, "for the money", are most
uncomfortable, a far cry from Joe's large kitchen, radiating heat, and
his well-stocked pantry.

Likewise, such a world, dominated by the lure of money and social
prejudice, also leads to the warping of people and morals, to family
discord and war between man and woman. In contrast to London's
corruption stands Joe, despite his intellectual and social
limitations, in whom the values of the heart prevail and who has
natural wisdom.


Pip's conscience
==================
Another important theme is Pip's sense of guilt, which he has felt
from an early age. After the encounter with the convict Magwitch, Pip
is afraid that someone will find out about his crime and arrest him.
The theme of guilt comes into even greater effect when Pip discovers
that his benefactor is a convict. Pip has an internal struggle with
his conscience throughout 'Great Expectations', hence the long and
painful process of redemption that he undergoes.

Pip's moral regeneration is a true pilgrimage punctuated by suffering.
Like Christian in Bunyan's 'The Pilgrim's Progress', Pip makes his way
up to light through a maze of horrors that afflict his body as well as
his mind. This includes the burns he suffers from saving Miss Havisham
from the fire; the illness that requires months of recovery; the
threat of a violent death at Orlick's hands; debt, and worse, the
obligation of having to repay them; hard work, which he recognises as
the only worthy source of income, hence his return to Joe's forge.
Even more important is his acceptance of Magwitch, a coarse outcast of
society.

Dickens makes use of symbolism, in chapter 53, to emphasise Pip's
moral regeneration. As he prepares to go down the Thames to rescue the
convict, a veil lifted from the river and Pip's spirit. Symbolically,
the fog that enveloped the marshes as Pip left for London has finally
lifted, and he feels ready to become a man.



Pip is redeemed by love, that, for Dickens as for generations of
Christian moralists, is only acquired through sacrifice. Pip's
reluctance completely disappears and he embraces Magwitch. After this,
Pip's loyalty remains constant, during the imprisonment, trial, and
death of the convict. He grows selfless and his "expectations" are
confiscated by the Crown. Moments before Magwitch's death, Pip reveals
that Estella, Magwitch's daughter, is alive, "a lady and very
beautiful. And I love her". Here the greatest sacrifice: the
recognition that he owes everything, even Estella, to Magwitch; his
new debt becomes his greatest freedom.

Pip returns to the forge, his previous state, and to meaningful work.
The philosophy expressed here by Dickens, that of a person happy with
their contribution to the welfare of society, is in line with Thomas
Carlyle's theories and his condemnation, in 'Latter-Day Pamphlets'
(1850), of the system of social classes flourishing in idleness, much
like that of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Dickens's hero is neither
an aristocrat nor a capitalist but a working-class boy.

In 'Great Expectations', the true values are childhood, youth and
heart. The heroes of the story are the young Pip, a true visionary,
and still developing person, open, sensible, who is persecuted by
soulless adults. Then the adolescent Pip and Herbert, imperfect but
free, intact, playful, endowed with fantasy in a boring and frivolous
world. Magwitch is also a positive figure, a man of heart, victim of
false appearances and of social images, formidable and humble, bestial
but pure, a vagabond of God, despised by men. There is also Pip's
affectionate friend Joe, the enemy of the lie. Finally, there are
women like Biddy.


Imperialism
=============
Edward W. Said, in his 1993 work 'Culture and Imperialism', interprets
'Great Expectations' in terms of postcolonial theory about
late-eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British imperialism. Pip's
disillusionment when he learns his benefactor is an escaped convict
from Australia, along with his acceptance of Magwitch as surrogate
father, is described by Said as part of "the imperial process", that
is, the way colonialism exploits the weaker members of a society. Thus
the British trading post in Cairo legitimatises Pip's work as a clerk,
but the money earned by Magwitch's honest labour is illegitimate,
because Australia is a penal colony, and Magwitch is forbidden to
return to Britain. Said states that Dickens has Magwitch return to be
redeemed by Pip's love, paving the way for Pip's own redemption, but
despite this moral message, the book still reinforces standards that
support the authority of the British Empire. Said's interpretation
suggests that Dickens's attitude backs Britain's exploitation of
Middle East "through trade and travel", and that 'Great Expectations'
affirms the idea of keeping the Empire and its peoples in their
place--at the exploitable margins of British society.

However, the novel's Gothic and Romance genre elements, challenge
Said's assumption that 'Great Expectations' is a realist novel like
Daniel Defoe's 'Robinson Crusoe'.


            Novels influenced by ''Great Expectations''
======================================================================
Dickens's novel has influenced a number of writers. Sue Roe's
'Estella: Her Expectations' (1982), for example, explores the inner
life of an Estella fascinated with a Havisham figure. Miss Havisham is
again important in 'Havisham: A Novel' (2013), a book by Ronald Frame,
that features an imagining of the life of Miss Catherine Havisham from
childhood to adulthood. The second chapter of Rosalind Ashe's
'Literary Houses' (1982) paraphrases Miss Havisham's story, with
details about the nature and structure of Satis House and coloured
imaginings of the house within. Miss Havisham is also central to 'Lost
in a Good Book' (2002), Jasper Fforde's alternative history fantasy
novel, which features a parody of Miss Havisham. It won the
Independent Mystery Booksellers Association 2004 Dilys Award.

Magwitch is the protagonist of Peter Carey's 'Jack Maggs' (1997),
which is a re-imagining of Magwitch's return to England, with the
addition, among other things, of a fictionalised Dickens character and
plot-line. Carey's novel won the Commonwealth Writers Prize in 1998.
'Mister Pip' (2006), a novel by New Zealand author Lloyd Jones, won
the 2007 Commonwealth Writers' Prize. 'Mister Pip' is set in a village
on the Papua New Guinea island of Bougainville during a brutal civil
war there in the 1990s, where the young protagonist's life is impacted
in a major way by her reading of 'Great Expectations'.

In May 2015, Udon Entertainment's Manga Classics line published a
manga adaptation of 'Great Expectations'.


                            Adaptations
======================================================================
Like many other Dickens novels, 'Great Expectations' has been filmed
for the cinema or television and adapted for the stage numerous times.
The film adaptation in 1946 gained the greatest acclaim. The story is
often staged, and less often produced as a musical. The 1939 stage
play and the 1946 film that followed from that stage production did
not include the character Orlick and ended the story when the
characters were still young adults. That character has been excluded
in many televised adaptations made since the 1946 movie by David Lean.
Following are highlights of the adaptations for film and television,
and for the stage, since the early 20th century.

; Film and television
* 1917 - 'Great Expectations', a silent film, starring Jack Pickford,
directed by Robert G. Vignola. This is a lost film.
* 1922 - Silent film, and the first adaptation not in English, made in
Denmark, starring Martin Herzberg, directed by A. W. Sandberg.
* 1934 - 'Great Expectations' film starring Phillips Holmes and Jane
Wyatt, directed by Stuart Walker.
* 1946 - 'Great Expectations', the most celebrated film version,
starring John Mills as Pip, Bernard Miles as Joe, Alec Guinness as
Herbert, Finlay Currie as Magwitch, Martita Hunt as Miss Havisham,
Anthony Wager as Young Pip, Jean Simmons as Young Estella and Valerie
Hobson as the adult Estella, directed by David Lean. It came fifth in
a 1999 BFI poll of the top 100 British films.
* 1954 - the first television adaptation shown as a two-part
television version starring Roddy McDowall as Pip and Estelle Winwood
as Miss Havisham. It aired as an episode of the show 'Robert
Montgomery Presents'.
* 1959 - 'Great Expectations' - BBC television version aired in 13
parts, starring Dinsdale Landen as Pip, Helen Lindsay as Estella,
Colin Jeavons as Herbert Pocket, Marjorie Hawtrey as Miss Havisham and
Derek Benfield as Landlord. It was rebroadcast in 1960, but has not
been seen since, as Part 8 is missing.
* 1967 - 'Great Expectations' - a BBC television serial starring Gary
Bond as Pip and Francesca Annis. BBC issued the series on DVD in 2017.
* 1974 - 'Great Expectations' - a film starring Michael York as Pip
and Simon Gipps-Kent as Young Pip, Sarah Miles and James Mason,
directed by Joseph Hardy.
* 1981 - 'Great Expectations' - a BBC serial starring Stratford Johns,
Gerry Sundquist, Joan Hickson, Patsy Kensit and Sarah-Jane Varley.
Produced by Barry Letts, and directed by Julian Amyes.
* 1983 - an animated version, starring Phillip Hinton, Liz Horne,
Robin Stewart, and Bill Kerr, adapted by Alexander Buzo.
* 1987 - 'Great Expectations: The Untold Story'
* 1989 - 'Great Expectations', a Disney Channel six-part film starring
Anthony Hopkins as Magwitch, John Rhys-Davies as Joe Gargery, and Jean
Simmons as Miss Havisham, directed by Kevin Connor.
* 1998 - 'Great Expectations', a film starring Ethan Hawke, Gwyneth
Paltrow, Robert De Niro, and Anne Bancroft, directed by Alfonso
Cuarón. This adaptation is set in contemporary New York City, and
renames Pip to Finn and Miss Havisham to Nora Dinsmoor. The film's
score was composed by Patrick Doyle.
* 1999 - 'Great Expectations', a film starring Ioan Gruffudd as Pip,
Justine Waddell as Estella, and Charlotte Rampling as Miss Havisham
(Masterpiece Theatre--TV)
* 2000 - 'Pip', an episode of the television show 'South Park',
starring Matt Stone as Pip, Eliza Schneider as Estella, and Trey
Parker as Miss Havisham.
* 2011 - 'Great Expectations', a three-part BBC serial. Starring Ray
Winstone as Magwitch, Gillian Anderson as Miss Havisham, and Douglas
Booth as Pip.
* 2012 - 'Great Expectations', a film directed by Mike Newell,
starring Ralph Fiennes as Magwitch, Helena Bonham Carter as Miss
Havisham and Jeremy Irvine as Pip.
* 2012 - 'Magwitch', a film written and directed by Samuel Supple,
starring Samuel Edward Cook as Magwitch, Candis Nergaard as Molly, and
David Verrey as Jaggers. The film is a prequel to 'Great Expectations'
made for the Dickens bicentenary. It was screened at the Toronto
International Film Festival and the Morelia International Festival.
* 2016 - 'Fitoor' is an Indian Hindi-language romantic drama film
directed by Abhishek Kapoor, starring Aditya Roy Kapur, Katrina Kaif,
Tabu  and Ajay Devgn. The film is set and filmed in Kashmir.
* 2023 - 'Great Expectations,' a six-part BBC and FX co-production,
scripted and executive produced by Steven Knight, and starring Olivia
Colman as Miss Havisham, Fionn Whitehead as Pip, Johnny Harris as
Magwitch, Bashy as Jaggers, Shalom Brune-Franklin as Estella.

;Stage
* 1871 -  'Great Expectations' by W.S. Gilbert, playwright of the
Gilbert & Sullivan operas. The play opened at the Royal Court
Theatre on 29 May 1871 and ran for around 48 performances. Pip was
played at various ages by Jessie Powell and Miss M Brennan, with
Edward Righton as Joe, JC Cowper as Magwitch, John Clayton as Jaggers,
and Eleanor Bufton as Estella. Miss Havisham did not appear as a
character in the play, which was revived on 17 March 1877 at the Royal
Aquarium Theatre, where it ran for just a month.
* 1939 - adaptation made by Alec Guinness and staged at Rudolf Steiner
Hall, which was to influence David Lean's 1946 film, in which both
Guinness and Martita Hunt reprised their stage roles.
* 1975 - Stage Musical (London West End). Music by Cyril Ornadel,
lyrics by Hal Shaper, starring Sir John Mills. Ivor Novello Award for
Best British Musical.
* 1988 - Glasgow Mayfest, stage version by the Tag Theatre Company in
association with the Gregory Nash group, adapted by John Clifford; the
cast included a young Alan Cumming and the staging included dance, and
it was a success.
* 1995 - Stage adaptation of 'Great Expectations' at Dublin's Gate
Theatre by Hugh Leonard.
* 2002 - Melbourne Theatre Company four-hour re-telling, in an
adaptation by company director Simon Phillips.
* 2005 - Royal Shakespeare Company adaptation by the Cheek by Jowl
founders Declan Donnellan and Nick Ormerod, with Sian Phillips as Miss
Havisham.
* 2011 - English Touring Theatre and Watford Palace Theatre production
of adaptation by Tanika Gupta.
* 2013 - West End adaptation written by Jo Clifford and directed by
Graham McLaren. Paula Wilcox as Miss Havisham, Chris Ellison as
Magwitch. This was a revival of the 1988 adaptation, without dance.
This play was filmed in 2013.
* 2015 - Dundee Repertory Theatre adaptation written by Jo Clifford
and directed by Jemima Levick.
* 2016 - West Yorkshire Playhouse adaptation written by Michael Eaton
and directed by Lucy Bailey. Starring Jane Asher as Miss Havisham.
* 2022 - A one-woman adapted show of 'Great Expectations' performed by
Eddie Izzard in New York City at the Greenwich House Theater between
2022 and 2023, featuring Izzard performing over 20 characters.
* 2023 - Eddie Izzard transferred her one-woman show to London at the
Garrick Theatre on 26 May for a limited 6-week engagement.


Texts
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* , with an unsigned and unpaginated introduction
* , introduction and notes by Margaret Cardwell
*  introduction by David Trotter
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Life and work of Dickens
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* , edited by J. W. T. Ley, 1928
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* , first published 1945
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About ''Great Expectations''
==============================
*
* , texts from Forster, Whipple, Chesterton, Leacock, Baker, House,
Johnson, van Ghent, Stange, Hagan, Connolly, Engel, Hillis Miller,
Moynahan, Van de Kieft, Hardy, Lindberg, Partlow
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* , texts from Chesterton, Brooks, Garis, Gissing, 'et al'
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* , texts from Brooks, Connor, Frost, Gilmour, Sadrin, 'et al'.
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*  (distributed by Penguin)


Online editions
=================
*
[https://www.ollibrary.com/2022/02/great-expectations-by-charles-dickens.html
Great Expectations read online at ollibrary]
* [https://bookwise.io/charles-dickens/great-expectations Great
Expectations read online at Bookwise]
*
*
[https://archive.org/stream/greatexpectation00dickiala#page/n11/mode/2up
'Great Expectations'] with illustrations, bound with 'The Uncommercial
Traveller' at Internet Archive
*
*
[https://web.archive.org/web/20080502010110/http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/d/dickens/charles/d54ge/complete.html
'Great Expectations']  - 1867 edition in modern type as e-book, no
illustrations, from University of Adelaide Library, Australia, last
updated 27 March 2016
* [http://dickens.stanford.edu/archive/great/expectations.html 'Great
Expectations'] - PDF scans of the entire novel as it originally
appeared in 'All the Year Round'
*


Other
=======
*
[https://web.archive.org/web/20080614093654/http://www.wisbechmuseum.org.uk/virtualtour_libraries.htm
Original manuscript] - held at Wisbech & Fenland Museum, Wisbech
*
[http://www.londonfictions.com/charles-dickens-great-expectations.html
David Parker's article on the London Fictions site about the London of
'Great Expectations']
* [http://charlesdickenspage.com/dickens_london_map.html Map of
Dickens's London]
*
[https://archive.org/download/TheaterGuildontheAir/Tgoa_53-04-05_ep147-Great_Expectations.mp3
1953 'Theatre Guild on the Air' radio adaptation] at Internet Archive


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