Charles Dickens

General Press

Written in the last decade of Dickens' life, 'Great Expectations' was praised widely and universally admired. It was his last great novel, and many critics believe it to be his finest. Readers and critics alike praised it for its masterful plot, which rises above the melodrama of some of his earlier works, and for its three-dimensional, psychologically realistic characters—characters much deeper and more interesting than the one-note caricatures of earlier novels. It depicts the growth and personal development of an orphan named Pip. The novel was first published in serial form in Dickens's weekly periodical 'All the Year Round', from 1 December 1860 to August 1861. It is set among the marshes of Kent and in London in the early to mid-1800s. The Great Expectations contains some of Dickens most memorable scenes, including its opening, in a graveyard, when the young orphan Pip is accosted by the escaped convict, Abel Magwitch. It is full of extreme imagery, poverty, prison ships, barriers and chains, and fights to the death. Upon its release, Thomas Carlyle spoke of "All that Pip's nonsense". Later, George Bernard Shaw praised the novel as "All of one piece and consistently truthfull". Dickens felt Great Expectations was his best work, calling it "a very fine idea". Throughout the narrative, typical Dickensian themes emerge: wealth and poverty, love and rejection, and the eventual triumph of good over evil. This book has become very popular and is now taught as a classic in many English classes. It has been translated into many languages and adapted many times in film and other media. Publisher : General Press

Great Expectations

Abigail Mills

The death close before me was terrible, but far more terrible than death was the dread of being misremembered after death. 

fareez

Honey 🍯 

Young as I was, I believe that I dated a new admiration of Joe from that night. We were equals afterwards, as we had been before; but, afterwards at quiet times when I sat looking at Joe and thinking about him I had a new sensation of feeling conscious that I was looking up to Joe in my heart.

Julie <3

What could I become with these surroundings? How could my character fail to be influenced by them? Is it to be wondered at if my thoughts were dazed, as my eyes were, when I came out into the natural light from the misty yellow rooms? 

I was lost in the mazes of my future fortunes, and could not retrace the by-paths we had trodden together. 

'Out of my thoughts! You are part of my existence, part of myself. You have been in every line I have ever read, since I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every prospect I have ever seen since -on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been the embodiment of every graceful fancy that my mind has ever become acquainted with. The stones of which the strongest London buildings are made, are not more real, or more impossible to be displaced by your hands, than your presence and influence have been to me, there and every where, and will be. Estella, to the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my character.’

Alissa 

Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the forma- tion of the first link on one memorable day.

But l loved Joe — perhaps for no better reason in those early days than because the dear fellow let me love him — and, as to him, my inner self was not so easily composed. It was much upon my mind (particularly when I first saw him looking about for his file) that I ought to tell Joe the whole truth. Yet did not, and for the reason that I mistrusted that if I did, he would think me worse than I was. 

In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong. 

“Do you want to be a gentleman, to spıte her or to gain her over?” Biddy quietly asked me, after a pause. 

 "Because, if it is to spite her," Biddy pursued, "I should think — but you know best — that might be better and more independently done by caring nothing for her words. And if it is to gain her over, I should think — but you know best — she was not worth gaining over." 

Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlaying our hard hearts. I was better after I had cried, than before — more sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more gentle. If I had cried before, I should have had Joe with me then.

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