Charles Dickens' Great Expectations

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Charles
Dickens Pip’s character’s importance to the plot of the novel
“Great Expectations” is paramount. Charles Dickens uses an ongoing theme over the course of this novel. Dickens creates
Pip to be a possible prototype of his own and his father’s life. Pip’s qualities are kept under wraps because the changes in him are more important than his general personality. Dickens created Pip to be a normal everyday person that goes through many changes, which allows a normal reader to relate and feel sympathetic towards Pip.
Dickens reveals character traits in Pip similar to both himself and his father. John Dickens, Charles’ father, worked as a clerk and was careless with money. John was said to be a good hearted man, however he had a prison record, arrested for debt. All of these characteristics were also shared by Pip in the novel “Great Expectations” (Priestley,
96). A bit of Charles can be seen after Wheatley-2 Pip and
Estella met. When Charles met Ellen Tarnan, “He Behaved more like an infatuated youth than a mature man” (Prestley,
97). This is also the same way Pip acted toward Estella which may be an intentional characteristic of himself since this novel was written after Charles met Ellen. Dickens often wrote about his personal life in his novels as with the sense of abandonment he wrote about in “David Copperfield”
(par. 12). His sister and blacksmith husband, Joe Gargery, brought up pip as an orphan. Pip and Joe had a close personal relationship, possibly because they were said to be both “Brought up by hand” (Dickens, 6). Pip’s guardians brought him up to know the difference between right and wrong. After doing wrong Pip often feels guilty and shameful which is a trait of Pip’s throughout the novel. Pip first felt shameful after stealing food for Wheatley-3 The escaped convict. While going downstairs Pip’s guilty conscience began to get the best of him. Pip began to imagine that every board was yelling “Stop thief” and “Get up Mrs. Joe” (par.
32). Pip’s good human qualities came out when he felt sorry for the convict being cold and hungry. Pip knew he had done wrong by stealing, and once again felt guilty. Pip went to bed that night shameful and had a dream that he too was a criminal for stealing from Mrs. Joe. Pip’s attitude begins to change after he visits Miss Havisham’s for the first time. This of course is where Pip first meets Estella, his love interest throughout the remainder of the novel. Pip begins to no longer feel proud of where he comes from but instead shameful. Pip decides that he wants to become a gentleman.

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