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Summary analysis of Charles Dickens Great Expectations
The role of the woman in literature
The role of the woman in literature
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People are a lot like butterflies. Butterflies start out as caterpillars and progressively change throughout their life. People are like this too, but we do not start out as caterpillars. we start as humans and stay humans. The thing that changes us are other people. Just like in Great Expectations, the novel by Charles Dickens. Pip, the main character, is influenced by various women and starts to change from the influences they have given him. The first woman that really influenced Pip was Estella. Ever since Pip was a young boy she has been imperious towards him. “ With this boy! Why, he is just a common laboring boy!”(Dickens 33) Estella was telling Miss Havisham that she does not want to play with a common boy like Pip. Ever since Pip …show more content…
Biddy always wants what is good for Pip and always helps him the right decisions. For example, Pip needed help deciding if he wanted to be a gentleman or not. Biddy helps Pip by asking of he wants to be a gentleman because he wants to gain Estella over or to spite her. Pip does not want Biddy inferring either of those accusations, even though they are correct. She tell shim that if he is doing it to gain her over, Estella is not worth gaining. If it is to spite her that it would be better to do it independently with caring words. (Dickens 66) She also helps Pip by telling him to go visit Joe whenever he comes back home. That helps Pip because he is afraid to visit Joe when Joe has done so much for him and Pip has done so little in return. Another examples when Pip goes home to ask Biddy’s hand in marriage and she is already married to Joe. This tells Pip that not everyone is going to wait on him and he needs to realize what real life is. The final woman that helps influence Pip is Miss Havisham. She is the one who pushes Pip so hard to love Estella. “ Love her, love her, love her! If she favors you, love her. If she wounds you, love her. If she tears your heart to pieces—and as it gets older and stronger it will tear deeper—love her, love her, love her! Hear me, Pip! I adopted her to be loved. I bred her and educated her to be loved. I developed her into what she is, that she might be loved. Love her!” “ I’ll
She acts as if they were pets rather than human beings, to be loved or not at
While Biddy is compassionate, warm and loving, Estella goes out of her way to be cold and rude. These personality characteristics are not just represented toward Pip, but to everyone that these two women meet. Estella acknowledges her flawed personality, even stating that she has “no softness … no sympathy” (29). Throughout the novel Estella knows of her abrasiveness towards others and often feels remorse for it, but continues to show it. Her rudeness becomes an accepted part of her character and but separates as a distinct part of her character, meaning she isn’t an evil character in the same way as Compeyson or her eventual husband Drummle, Estella simply cannot help the character traits she acquired during her youth. By direct contrast, Biddy’s personality is everything that Estella’s isn’t. While Estella is obnoxious and impatient toward Pip, Biddy is “the most obliging of girls” (10) even being patient with Pip when she was teaching him how to read. Biddy’s exemplary character casts her as exactly the type of person that Pip should want to fall in love with, especially when the only other option is Estella. But of course, Pip being the confused boy that he is, is unable to see that and only has feelings for Estella. Beyond being nice and obliging, Biddy was also very trustworthy toward Pip as a child. At one point Pip says, “I reposed complete confidence in no one but Biddy: but I told poor Biddy everything.” (12) Biddy acted as a confidant to Pip especially during his early traumatic years with Mrs. Joe and Miss Havisham. While Pip most likely wanted to have Estella as a trustworthy friend, she pushed him away and acted cold at every possible opportunity. Pip acknowledges Biddy for being an excellent friend and being sympathetic to his problems, even saying how “Biddy had a deep
In Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, the author begins the tale by revealing Pip's arrogance towards previous companions. By the end of the story, we learn of Pip's love and compassion for everyone.
describes her baby as precious and if it is worth a lot to her, 'love
As the visits to Miss Havisham's increase, Pip realizes his feelings for Estella. He practically cannot live without her, but she treats him as a common boy. Pip wants more than anything to become uncommon so Estella might come to like him. He wants her to think of him as a person and not as an uneducated blacksmith apprentice. Estella begins to realize that Pip has feelings and taunts him by asking if he thinks she is pretty. A significant scene is when Estella questions Pip about herself and she slaps him. Then she teases him more and says why doesn't he cry again. Pip replies, "Because I'll never cry for you again," but he knows this is not true and says this "was, I suppose, a false declaration as ever was made, for I was inwardly crying for her then, and I know what I know of the pain she caused me afterwards" (94).
In Great Expectations, Pip was one of lower class. Although he did not have the fortunes, Pip was happy. Once he was introduced to the rich Miss Havisham and her daughter Estella, he fell in love. Estella became the object of his affection, yet because she was considered high class, there wou...
Previously, Pip had thought everyone had called knaves jacks, but now that he knew the truth, he wanted to change his “common ways” and be more like Estella. “It is a most miserable thing to feel ashamed of home… Within a single year, all this was changed. Now it was all coarse and common” (98). Unfortunately, his desire to impress Estella
Throughout Dickens’ novel Great Expectations, the character, personality, and social beliefs of Pip undergo complete transformations as he interacts with an ever-changing pool of characters presented in the book. Pip’s moral values remain more or less constant at the beginning and the end; however, it is evident that in the time between, the years of his maturation and coming of adulthood, he is fledgling to find his place in society. Although Pip is influenced by many characters throughout the novel, his two most influential role models are: Estella, the object of Miss Havisham’s revenge against men, and Magwitch, the benevolent convict. Exposing himself to such diverse characters Pip has to learn to discern right from wrong and chose role models who are worthy of the title.
As his first contact with a wealthy person, Miss Havisham prompts Pip to try and better himself financially. She also, indirectly, pressures Pip into changing through her influence over Estella. Estella's cruel behaviour towards Pip is the direct result of Miss Havisham's teachings. Embittered by her own broken engagement, Miss Havisham taught the girl to be cruel to men, so she learned to "break their hearts and have no mercy!" (Dickens, 108.
taunts Pip and is very cruel to him, but he still falls in love with her. Miss Havisham is teaching Estella to
Throughout Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, the main character Pip goes through quite the journey and it ends up changing who is he. These experiences and rough patches end up proving how mentally tough Pip is. From Pip’s self-awareness progression over the book, and with the type of book Dickens wrote characters end up realizing by the end of the book who they really are. Also, class structure within the book shapes Pip and dictates what Pip goes through on his journey. When the Mid Victorian Period comes around, the middle class explodes as capitalism does as well and this has a big role in Pip’s experiences.
...e you must respect for her sincerity, her high principles, her generous trust of others, and her patience under trails that would be too great for much stronger heads...and in spite of her romantic folly she has so much good heart that it serves her in place of good sense” .
In order to make more money Pip’s uncle sends Pip to a psychotic old lady’s house named Mrs. Havisham. Mrs. Havisham is a mean and nasty character who constantly bickers at Pip and tells him of his unimportance. Pip continues to be mild mannered and respectful to Mrs. Havisham yet he begins to see that he will never get ahead in life just being nice. Mrs. Havisham uses Pip as sort of a guinea pig to take out her passion of revenge against men. She does this by using her daughter, Estella to torment Pip.
Adopted by Miss Havisham as a baby, Estella rises to a high social standing. Raised to be protected from Miss Havisham’s mistakes in love, she is trained to repress notions of romantic love. By “[stealing] her heart away and [putting] ice in its place,” Miss Havisham thus prevents Estella from gaining the ability to achieve true happiness in life. The true meaning and feeling of love is unknown to Estella. Condescension and insensibility to others is sowed into her being early on, and she only can become more incapable of loving as she matures. When Pip is hired to become her playmate, she revels in the opportunity to exercise her prowess. Encouraged by Miss Havisham, Estella hones her ability to break hearts with Pip, but he is only the first of the many destined to befall that fate.
Estella is the main incident in Pip’s life that ultimately leads to his obnoxious and contemptible behavior in the future. This is because of his love for her, even after their first encounter he describes Estella as “very pretty” yet “very insulting”. Unperturbed by this description, Estella continues her disgraceful treatment of the young and impressionable boy when she feeds, and treats him as if he were an animal, continuing to address him like an animal, she does not bother to learn his name, still referring to as boy.