Great Expectations Suffering Essay

The Influence of Suffering

Every person faces a form of suffering at some point in their life, and it can be handled by either continuing to live in pain or letting go and changing their motivation in life. Suffering, defined as undergoing and feeling pain or distress, is meant to shape and reveal one’s character through the manner in which they overcome their suffering. In the book Great Expectations Charles Dickens uses the characters Magwitch and Estella to contrast a theme that people’s past suffering changes their future intent of life. The endurance of eternal pain can lead people to form positive new habits. In the beginning of the book, the character Magwitch is faced with many problems that send him spiralling downward into a time of struggle. By the end of the book, his struggle eventually leads him to a better life. For example, in the

The character Estella is introduced as a heartless character, and through the orders of her step-mother, inflicts pain on others and causes suffering upon herself, as well as everyone around her. Estella, through Pip’s words, confesses she has become heartless due to how Miss Havisham raised her. Pip says that “. . .she gave me the assurance that suffering had been stronger than Miss Havisham’s teaching, and had given her a heart to understand what my heart used to be” (Dickens 511). Throughout her life, Estella struggled with her ability to love, but as she gets older she continues her old habits as a way to free herself of her suffering. Estella constantly rejects Pip’s love, and leaves Pip thinking, “. . .I know what I know of the pain she cost me afterwards” (Dickens 83). Estella does not diminish Pip once, but many times throughout the book, repeatedly inflicting her suffering onto him. Estella temporarily resolves her suffering by redirecting her negativity onto the people who love