Chapter 39 Great Expectations

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Chapter 39 is a Pivotal One, Why? How does Dickens communicate the

importance of the drama of the chapter to the reader?

In chapter 39, Pip's benefactor is revealed. It is around this person

that the mystery of Pip's expectations is built. It is a pivotal

chapter in the way the plot develops. In this chapter Pip finally

accepts that the way he acted in London was wrong and that chasing

Estella was very pointless. The importance and drama of this chapter

can be seen from the beginning. Dickens shows this to the reader in

many ways, such as the build-up of atmosphere between certain people,

the drama and the mystery behind Magwitch's behaviour and the way he

acts, and Pip's often fluttering state of emotion. The first couple of

lines from the chapter read: "I was three and twenty years of age. Not

another word had I heard to enlighten me on the subject of my

expectations, and my twenty-third birthday was a week gone." It also

makes the reader think about where Pip's wealth is coming from. This

makes the reader very curious, and also possibly provides a clue that

something relating to the mystery about the wealth may soon be

answered. Pip describes the absence of Herbert as leaving him

"dispirited and anxious, and long disappointed", and "the day just

closed as I sat down to read had been the worst of all." Nothing has

happened, but there is the feeling that everything is not as it seems,

which is then made clearer by Dickens' description of the atmosphere

of London: "It was wretched weather; stormy and wet, stormy and wet:

and mud, mud, mud, deep in all the streets. Day after day, a vast

heavy veil had been driving over London from the East, and it drove

still, as if in the East there were an eternity of c...

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...im. Before

falling asleep, he locks Magwitch in Herbert's room, fearing for his

own safety and when he wakes up the next day he is in "thick black

darkness". The chapter's ending is a cliffhanger, where Dickens'

creates intense drama leaving the reader in suspense, not knowing what

to expect next. Chapter 39 is a pivotal one - highly-charged with

drama and emotion. After being forced to face the dark and humble

reality of his "great expectations" and his behaviour, Pip is never

the same. From this point onwards, Pip finds freedom in trying to help

Magwitch escape and also, begins to grow quite fond of him. The

separate voices of the narrator and the leading character in the novel

soon become almost unnoticeable and Pip eventually realises that truly

"great expectations" involve not wealth, London or even Estella, but

living simply, honestly and sincerely.

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