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GREAT EXPECTATIONS - Coggle Diagram
GREAT EXPECTATIONS
THEMES
Social Class
Throughout Great Expectations, Dickens explores the class system of Victorian England, ranging from the most wretched criminals (Magwitch) to the poor peasants of the marsh country (Joe and Biddy) to the middle class (Pumblechook) to the very rich (Miss Havisham).
The theme of social class is central to the novel’s plot and to the ultimate moral theme of the book—Pip’s realization that wealth and class are less important than affection, loyalty, and inner worth.
Pip realises that despite the esteem in which he holds Estella, one’s social status is in no way connected to one’s real character.
Drummle, for instance, is an upper-class lout, while Magwitch, a persecuted convict, has a deep inner worth
Dickens generally ignores the nobility and the hereditary aristocracy in favour of characters whose fortunes have been earned through commerce.
Even Miss Havisham’s family fortune was made through the brewery that is still connected to her manor.
In this way, by connecting the theme of social class to the idea of work and self-advancement, Dickens subtly reinforces the novel’s overarching theme of ambition and self-improvement.
Crime, Guilt, and Innocence
From the handcuffs Joe mends at the smithy to the gallows at the prison in London, the imagery of crime and criminal justice pervades the book, becoming an important symbol of Pip’s inner struggle to reconcile his own inner moral conscience with the institutional justice system.
the external trappings of the criminal justice system (police, courts, jails, etc.) become a superficial standard of morality that Pip must learn to look beyond to trust his inner conscience.
explored throughout the novel largely through the characters of the convicts and the criminal lawyer Jaggers.
Magwitch, for instance, frightens Pip at first simply because he is a convict, and Pip feels guilty for helping him because he is afraid of the police.
By the end of the book, however, Pip has discovered Magwitch’s inner nobility, and is able to disregard his external status as a criminal.
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Family
Pip grows up with love and support from Joe, but fails to see the value of the unconditional love Joes gives him.
Estella is exposed to damaging values from her adopted mother, Miss Havisham, and gradually learns from experience what it actually means to care about someone.
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For both characters, learning who to trust and how to have a loving relationship with family members is a major part of the growing-up process.
Both Estella and Pip live with the consequences of their family histories, but their difficult family experiences also helps to give them perspective on what is truly important in life.
SYMBOLS
Satis House
Dickens creates a magnificent Gothic setting whose various elements symbolize Pip’s romantic perception of the upper class and many other themes of the book.
Miss Havisham’s wedding dress becomes an ironic symbol of death and degeneration. The wedding dress and the wedding feast symbolize Miss Havisham’s past, and the stopped clocks throughout the house symbolize her determined attempt to freeze time
Miss Havisham’s fortune is not the product of an aristocratic birth but of a recent success in industrial capitalism.
the crumbling, dilapidated stones of the house, as well as the darkness and dust that pervade it, symbolize the general decadence of the lives of its inhabitants and of the upper class as a whole.
The Mists on the Marshes
symbolize danger and uncertainty. Whenever Pip goes into the mists, something dangerous is likely to happen.
Pip must go through the mists when he travels to London shortly after receiving his fortune, alerting the reader that this apparently positive development in his life may have dangerous consequences.
the setting almost always symbolizes a theme in Great Expectations and always sets a tone that is perfectly matched to the novel’s dramatic action.
The Forge
he light emanating from it makes stand out among the dark mists of the marsh, an image which symbolically suggests that life in the forge can offer Pip a path to happiness regardless of his surroundings.
although his perspective evolves and he aims to reject the forge, it remains a steady and strong anchor in his family’s world.
the space of the forge, with its large fire and associations with Joe, is warm and familiar.
symbolizes the inherent goodness and respectability of Pip’s childhood and the opportunity it offers him to become a self-made man.
the forge’s stability, which the metals inside it represent, contrasts significantly with the turbulent life Pip pursues in London. While Pip faces heartbreak, resentment, fear, and loss, the forge never loses its warmth and security.
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ANTAGONIST
She works to prevent Pip from achieving his goal of winning Estella’s love. Her role as an antagonist is complex because at first she seems to be supporting Pip in his goals: when he first meets Estella, Miss Havisham urges him to “love her, love her.”
Pip assumes that Miss Havisham is his benefactor, and that she is grooming him to be a gentleman so that he will eventually marry Estella. However, it is later revealed that Miss Havisham had nothing to do with Pip’s fortune, and that she encouraged Estella to manipulate him and break his heart.
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Miss Havisham reveals her motivation for thwarting Pip’s ambitions when she tells him “if you knew all my story… you would have some compassion for me, and a better understanding of me.”
Miss Havisham was cruelly mistreated by her brother and her fiancé, and has been seeking revenge against all men. Despite her role as antagonist, Pip shows forgiveness and empathy to Miss Havisham, explaining that “could I look upon her without compassion, seeing her punishment in the ruin she was.”
PROTAGONIST
Pip changes a great deal over the course of the novel, becoming self-aware and conscious of the fact that people are most often a mixture of both flaws and good intentions.
The empathy Pip eventually shows to both Miss Havisham and Magwitch, even though both of them have impeded his desires, shows that he has matured into a man capable of empathy and forgiveness.
ip’s intelligence and ambition inform the action of other characters such as Magwitch and Miss Havisham, who both see him as a tool to achieve their own desires.
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GENRE
The novel begins with Pip’s earliest recollection of naming himself, due to his “infant tongue.” By the end, Pip is established as a mature professional.
Not only does Pip physically grow and change over the course of the book, he also dramatically alters his understanding of what he thinks is important in life.
classic example of a bildungsroman, a category of literature that focuses on the progression of a central character as he or she matures into an adult and experiences significant psychological growth along the way.
by the end of the novel, Pip has been humbled and has a deeper understanding of true happiness.
The close focus on Pip’s journey to psychological and emotional maturity, made evident through a first-person narration, is a trademark characteristic of the bildungsroman genre.