Great Expectations and The Go Between

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Great Expectations and The Go Between Both Great Expectations and The Go Between concern young men from

lowly backgrounds who find themselves thrust into the world of the

leisured classes and are changed forever. What similarities and

differences do you see between the ways in which the two authors

handle and develop this shared situation?

The reason why we have chosen to compare and contrast Great

Expectations and The Go Between is because they have many obvious and

many subtle similarities which I am to discuss during t he course of

this Essay. Although the two books were written a century apart they

are based around the same themes highlighted later on in the essay. In

the introduction of both books we learn that they are both first

person narratives. The main figure in each book is the narrator who is

telling a story in retrospective after the main event that has shaped

his life. Leo, the main character in The Go Between is sixty years of

age when he tells his story whereas Pip is in his late twenties or

early thirties. Although this is true, the story of The Go Between is

about twelve to thirteen days of Leo's life in comparison to fourteen

years of Pip's life expectations. Also in The Go Between there is a

more careful story between the present and the past and a comparison

between Leo as a sixty year old and a twelve year old. There is also a

prologue and epilogue in The Go Between whereas Great Expectations

proceeds chronologically. There is little written about Pip being the

age he is when he is narrating, though we know a lit...

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...r thirteen. The cake with twelve candles is

cut and the another is not touched, representing the same image of

life stopping at this point as this is were Marian and Ted are found

together. These two references seem very deliberate as they both

stimulate the same theme of life stopping because of one individual

persons affect on them.

The main theme present in both novels is the theme of child abuse. I

think this is the most obvious as throughout the boys lives they are

used by adults to their own advantage and treated without respect as

they are from lowly backgrounds. Although Hartley and Dickens do not

focus on how this has affected them they have made this a definite

issue in both books, by using young ambitious boys both of whom fall

in love with a desired woman and of whom both come from a lowly

background.

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