Heart Imagery in Great Expectations

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Heart Imagery in Great Expectations

The heart is a symbolic barometer in Great Expectations that carries us from chapter to pulsating chapter. The novel's characters are forever wearing their hearts on their sleeves and in the process end up baring their souls within the text itself, and without, to the reader. What is the significance of hearts and their many states as described when Pip unfolds his own dramatic rags-to-riches-to-grace tale? Several scenes probe Miss Havisham's psyche with words about the condition of her heart. By analyzing them, we may be able to guess to what purpose Charles Dickens employs the heart imagery so frequently and so effectively.

For all the allusions which connect Miss Havisham to death-upon seeing her at the dressing table, Pip is immediately reminded of "some ghastly waxwork" and "a skeleton in the ashes of a rich dress," (93) -she is far from dead. Keeping her alive is the promise of youth: Estella and Pip. The promise the children give Miss Havisham, however, is not wholesome or optimistic, and neither is her communication with them. The first thing Miss Havisham reveals to Pip is that she suffers from a broken heart, "[uttering] the word...with strong emphasis, and with a weird smile that had a kind of boast," (94). This seems an odd confession for an adult to heave upon a child. Private miseries are kept quiet in order to spare children from the harsh reality of adult life.

But Miss Havisham is not worried about sparing anyone. Because she holds the family fortune, no one will insist that she snap out of her reverie of grief. Her intention is that Estella will learn to break men's hearts as recompense for Miss Havisham's having been broken. She admits to "sick fancies," and her demeanor so troubles Pip that he remarks, "Her contempt for me was so strong, that it became infectious, and I caught it" (95). Yet Pip is ready to forgive Miss Havisham for reducing him to self-hatred, even on that very first day: He tells us that as she watches the card game, Miss Havisham had "the appearance of having dropped... under the weight of a crushing blow" (96). Her posture softens him and he returns to Satis House over and over, even as he knows he is "under" the house's "influence" and it makes him "continue at heart to hate [his] trade" (158).

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