Personal Growth in Great Expectations

Personal Growth in Great Expectations

The coming of age novel Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens showed how a young simple boy grew into a gentleman, and slowly discovered that no matter what happened in his life it couldn't change who he was on the inside. His attitude and personality fluctuated throughout the three main stages of his life.

The first line of the book showed Pip's simplicity of thought by the way he described his nickname: "My father's family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip." (Pg.3)

His personality continued in the same manner until he met the stunning Estella and disturbed Miss Havisham. That was the point when his ignorance turned into envy, for all that his life was lacking living with his sister and Joe. He realized how much his family was different from that of the rich and wanted nothing more than to be accepted as a gentleman. The night he came home from Estella's he couldn't help but think of how common Estella would think his family was:

"Estella would consider Joe, a mere blacksmith: how think his boots, and how coarse his hands. I thought how Joe and my sister were there sitting In the kitchen and I had come up to bed from the kitchen, and how Miss Havisham and Estella never sat in a kitchen, but were far above the level of such common doings." (Pg.89)

After thinking of what the higher class would think of his family his own opinion of the Gargery's also shifted. He began to treat them with disrespect and acted as though he were better than them, even Joe, the one who had been his closest friend.

When Jaggers announced that there was an unknown person who wanted to send Pip to London to become a gentleman, Pip was overwhelmed with excitement and couldn't believe his dream had come true. He felt that this gave him the opportunity to become the man of Estella's dreams, which was all he could think about.

Pip lived the high life in London; he hired a servant and spends more money than he was supposed to.