PlanetPapers.com RSS Feedhttps://www.planetpapers.com/ Charles Dickens' Language in Great Expectations How Does Dickens’ Language Keep the Reader’s Interest? In ‘Great Expectations’ the reader’s interest is drawn in immediately, Dickens manages to catch the reader’s interest because he plays with the reader’s emotions instantly. We are automatically made to feel sorry for Pip because we learn, on the first page, that his family is dead and when “A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg” shouts at Pip we, the readers become helpless and can only watch. During the meeting of Pip and an escaped convict whom later we learn to be Magwitch, emotional drama is added throughout with sentences like “O! Don’t cut my throat, sir, I pleaded in terror” Dickens makes us feel very scared for Pip. In his writing Dickens uses poetic devices, especially triplets. An example of his use of triplets in the first chapter is during the scene where Pip meets Magwitch. “Tell us your name! said the man” “Once more, said the man” “ Show us where you live, said the man” Said the man is repeated three times and it disconnects Magwitch from the reader and allows the reader to not feel emotionally attached to him, it also means that Magwitch doesn’t have much emotion himself and it’s not until later that Dickens starts to add emotion into what Magwitch says. Charles Dickens includes many hidden meanings and subtleties in his writing, which adds extra depth and keeps the reading of his books interesting however many times you read them. Some of these meanings can be found in the names he gives the characters in his story, for example, Pip; a pip is a little seed that eventually grows into something much larger and grander as it’s life goes on and that is exactly what happens to Pip during ‘Great Expectations’. Dickens often uses long complex sentences that are broken up with commas to describe people and surroundings, these vivid descriptions add emotion and can create atmosphere exceedingly well. He uses so many adjectives in his writing and together with verbs it really captures the readers imagination, words like ‘smothered’ ‘lamed’ ‘limped’ ‘shivered’ ‘glared’ and ‘growled’. All theses appear in one paragraph together. Dickens does this so his readers can get a clear and exact image of what he’s describing, doing this then means the readers feel more involved with the story. “And that the flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, 2005-05-27T20:52:52-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Charles-Dickens-Language-in-Great-Expectations-6174.aspx Great Expectations - Effectiveness of Serial Release Many of Charles’ Dickens’ novels first appeared as weekly episodes in magazines in serial form. This is much harder to do than simply writing a novel due to the fact that just one bad episode could put people off from buying the next edition. To keep this from happening with Great Expectations, every episode had to leave the reader with a reason to purchase the next episode. To do this the writer Charles Dickens had to make readers curious or interested and desperate to find out what will happen to the characters they’ve, hopefully, if the serial is well written, become so well acquainted with, and are able to relate to. It’s the same with the television serials or “soap operas” of today, so called due to the fact that companies who produced soap originally sponsored them. They all need to have interesting storylines and multiple plots and most episodes need to end with what is known as a cliffhanger. The television companies generally use them, if particularly exiting and dramatic, to boost ratings, generally speaking this method is very successful. Dickens creates interesting situations all the time with characters in awkward places, conflicting opinions between characters with clashing personalities. They all have defining traits, which help the readers to connect with the characters, innumerable references to fire when the convict is around for example. Characters have to have their own, believable, personalities and act as you would expect them to. Otherwise the storyline would have become implausible and people wouldn’t have bought it. These qualities are particularly crucial in Great Expectations but never more so than in the first episode. The format, which the episode takes, is likely to affect the readers’ opinions on the series as a whole. Overcomplicating the novel with multiple storylines, plots and characters can be confusing, but readers want to be bored about as much as they want to be confused, so it is very difficult to find a happy medium. We stereotype the entire series on how good the first episode is. Which, although relatively unfair and in many cases not at all accurate, it is still what we tend to do. This is why the quality of the first episode of Great Expectations is so important as, although there’s a definite need for all the episodes to be well written and interesting, if the first episode isn’t then no matter how 2003-11-07T18:59:15-05:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-Effectiveness-of-Serial-Release-5238.aspx The three stages of Pip’s expectations are also stages of his personal and moral development When Pip was a child, he was a contented young boy. He wanted to grow up to be apprenticed to Joe and “had believed the forge as the glowing road to manhood.” He was a very sensitive child and afraid of doing something wrong this was shown when his guilty conscience along with his imagination haunted him with images of him being caught after he stole food for the convict. His fear of doing wrong was made clear when he referred to the time they took to discover the stolen items as “prolonging my misery.” The way his conscience had to wrestle with the idea that he had done a good deed showed insecurity as well as being afraid of doing wrong. He was an insecure child and would do anything but lose Joe’s love such as when he would not tell Joe about the stolen file. “The fear of losing Joe’s confidence, and thenceforth sitting in the chimney-corner at night, staring drearily at my forever lost companion and friend, tied up my tongue.” After visiting Miss Havisham’s and meeting Estella, Pip began to think about things he would not before. Estella insults him about his thick boots and coarse hands, before he would not have even thought that he had had thick boots let alone the fact that it was a bad thing. Pip became upset by the fact that he was ignorant and inadequate. He was ashamed of being a common labouring boy and he now thought everything to be coarse and common. As Estella looked down upon him, he did to, however Estella was attractive, and he confessed “She’s more beautiful than anybody ever was, and I admire her dreadfully, and I want to be a gentleman on her account.” This was the cause of his new discontented disposition and so he looked down on things and people that prevented him becoming a gentleman, and even started to feel “disaffection to Joe and the forge.” He begins to despise the things that kept him at the forge and believed that he “should never like Joe’s trade.” This also showed ingratitude, as he was not thankful for anything he had. Pip was inconsiderate and since he believed Biddy to below him he talked carelessly and made comments such as “If I could only get my self to fall in love with you-“. These refer to him being unfeeling as he 2001-12-28T13:00:00-05:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/The-three-stages-of-Pip’s-expectations-are-also-stages-of-his-personal-and-moral-development-4186.aspx Great Expectations The evolution of a person can be complicated when one has "great expectations." In Charles Dickens' finest novel, "Great Expectations," a young boy named Phillip Pirrup known as Pip who's great expectations are a dramatized exploration of human growth and the pressures that distort the potential of an ordinary individual, especially in the process of growing up. Pip is a simple blacksmith's boy who aspires to cross social boundaries when he realizes his own upbringing is common; however, he has no means to change; mysteriously, he is given the means, but wealth only brings him arrogance. He learns that happiness in life can be achieved only by hard work and the great expectations not grounded in reality can only lead to tragedy and heartache. Uncommonness on the inside is more important than uncommoness on the outside. Pip progresses through three stages of life, all of which he goes through different goals. In Pip's first stage of life he is an innocent boy with a good heart, whose goals are to be apprenticed as a blacksmith with his friend and guardian, Joe Gargery. Perhaps, he doesn't have very many goals as a seven-year-old because he doesn't know what the world has to impact upon him. This shows that Joe is a role model to Pip and is a factor of his life. In Pip's second stage of life, his goals change a bit to which makes him change his attitude toward his loved ones; he meets Estella, a rich snobby, but beautiful girl, whom rejects Pip, therefore Pip has a goal to become a gentleman to be in the company of Estella. This shows that Estella is an influence to his goals and affects his attitude in life. This also reveals that Pip becomes arrogant because of the predominance of Estella because he wants to be at the same level as her to with her. Pip's third stage in life has soon to come, his goal is to still be with Estella, but mostly he wants to help out his benefactor, Abel Magwitch, known as the "convict;" he also learns that his expectations are all one big sham. This shows how is attitude has changed from a cold hearted arrogant person to a warm hearted caring person. This also reveals that he has to help his benefactor in order to feel a level of satisfaction. Ultimately, Pip learns that his goal 2001-09-17T14:00:00-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-3735.aspx Great Expectations: the world of laws, crime and punishment <center><b>The World of Laws, Crime and Punishment in Great Expectations</b></center> Great Expectations criticises the Victorian judicial and penal system. Through the novel, Charles Dickens displays his point of view of criminality and punishment. This is shown in his portraits of all pieces of such system: the lawyer, the clerk, the judge, the prison authorities and the convicts. In treating the theme of the Victorian system of punishment, Dickens shows his position against prisons, transportation and death penalty. The main character, a little child who has expectations of becoming a gentleman to be of the same social position of the girls he loves, passes from having no interest on criminality and its penalties to be very concerned on the issue. By means of other characters, for instance Mrs. Joe Gargery, Dickens tries to define the people’s common view about convicts, transportation and capital punishment. In portraying the character of the convict, Dickens sets out the case in hand of two people sentenced to transportation for forgery of banknotes and analyses their psychology. By reading the novel, the reader becomes aware of the Victorian unfair justice regarding poor and illiterate people, but advantageous towards the rich and educated middle-class. The prison system in England may have had a significant effect on the life and writing of Charles Dickens due to his father’s imprisonment in Marshalsea Debtors’ Prison as a consequence of his debts. These kinds of prisons came to be workhouses for people who had lost all their belongings. In case debtors had family, it must accompany them in prison. This painful experience may have kept way in his mind for the rest of his life. His involvement with the legal world came when he was employed as a clerk at a lawyer’s office. His later interest in penology made him read many works related to this subject. For this reason, he incorporated both the treatment of convicts and capital punishment in many novels. Great Expectations is a harsh criticism on the British legal and penal System as well as on Victorian society, achieved after exploring his characters’ behaviour, since the laws were only unfair for those on the bottom rung of the social ladder. London was one of the greatest cities in the world in the 19th C. At this time huge amounts of money were invested in industry and buildings as trade with other countries increased. On the other side of the 2001-08-20T14:00:00-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-the-world-of-laws,-crime-and-punishment-3654.aspx Great Expectations - a look at themes, characters and style <b>General Info:</b> <li>A story of moral redemption. <li>The hero is an orphan raised in humble surroundings, in the early decades of the nineteenth century, comes into a fortune, and promptly disavows family and friends. <li>When the fortune first loses its lustre, then evaporates completely, he confronts his own ingratitude, and learns to love the man who both created and destroyed him. <li>The story is told by the hero himself, and the challenge Dickens faced in devising this first-person narrative was two-fold. <li>He had to ensure that Pip¡¦s confession of his faults ring true, so that we do not suppose him to be admitting them merely in order to win our sympathy. And he had to validate Pip¡¦s redemption by showing that it produces good deeds as well as good words. <li>Its admirable briskness is nowhere more apparent than in Pip¡¦s account of the feelings with which he once greeted the prospect of a visit from his old friend and protector, the blacksmith Joe Gargery. ¡§Not with pleasure, though I was bound to him by so many ties, with considerable disturbance, some mortification, and a keen sense of incongruity. If I could have kept him away by paying money, I certainly would have paid money.¡¨ (218) <li>There are times when Pip lays on the self-mortification a little too thickly, and times when he appears desperate for our approval. By and large, though, he is hard on himself to exactly the right (the convincing) degree. <b>Redemption</b> <li>The proof of Pip¡¦s redemption lies in good deeds rather than good words.: his secret acts of kindness, in securing Herbert a partnership in Clarricker¡¦s, and in securing Miss Havisham¡¦s good opinion of the long-suffering Matthew Pocket; his final refusal to accept money from MH, or from Magwitch; and, most significantly, his love for Magwitch. <li>The last of these good deeds, and the one hardest for the writer to authenticate, is made piercingly vivid by a subtle modification of narrative technique. This occurs in Vol III ch. XV, which describes the attempt to spirit Magwitch away down the Thames. Here, for the only time in the novel, the first-person narrative ceases to be Pip¡¦s way of thinking, however, honestly, about himself, and becomes instead an act of attention to others, and to the unfolding events. <li>Ripples of unease spread through the narrative, in descriptions of the docks and the river, but this is a generalised anxiety, or alertness, rather than the self-absorption, justifiable or not, which has 2000-10-15T14:00:00-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-a-look-at-themes,-characters-and-style-2371.aspx Great Expectations The story begins in a village near the marshes where a young boy named Pip lives. Because his parents are dead, he lives with his sister, Mrs. Joe Gargery and her husband Joe who’s a blacksmith and Pip’s trusted friend. Pip doesn’t have much of a future, he’s destined to become Joe’s apprentice and eventually a blacksmith. Then, Pip meets a convict out on the marshes. It seems like nothing important, despite it being frightening, but this meeting will change his life forever. The convict asks him to bring some food. Pip, fearing for his life, steals some food from his house, brings them to the convict and doesn’t see him again. Later, a stranger will show up in the Three Jolly Bargemen. He’ll scare Pip a little because he reminds him of the convict. Pip thinks he might be in danger, but instead, the stranger gives him two one-pound notes. At that time, not much connection is shown between the notes and the convict on the marshes, but later discoveries indicate that it was the convict that had sent the man with the notes. Suddenly, there’s a twist of fate. Pip’s invited to play at Miss Havisham’s. Miss Havisham is a wealthy old lady who lives uptown in a large, gloomy house. Next to the house is an old, decrepit brewery and a garden overrun with weeds, both remnants of better times. The interior of the house isn’t much looked after either. The drapes are closed as to block as much sunlight as possible; the only light inside is that of candles, and cobwebs decorate the furniture. Miss Havisham turns out to be an elderly woman in an old bridal dress that was once white, but has now faded to pale yellow. Most objects in the house were once white actually, but had also faded. And a remarkable fact was that all the clocks were stopped exactly at 8.40 A.M. Pip later finds out that Miss Havisham was abandoned by her fiancé at the altar at that time and straight after that, she had all the clocks stopped. Miss Havisham was heartbroken and turned into a bitter, cold woman. She stayed indoors, stopping the clocks and leaving everything the way it was on the day she was to be married. She stayed in the darkness, not seeing any sun or anything outside her mansion called Satis House. Satis stood for “enough”. As if to 2000-03-30T14:00:00-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-1818.aspx Great Expectations There are many common, familiar clichés about illusion versus truth. "All that glitters is not gold" and "Things are seldom what they seem" are the most universal hackneyed phrases, but they do not cover entirely every aspect of appearance versus reality. In Charles Dickens' novel, Great Expectations, there are several differences between the illusion and the truth. The appearance of certain things is often detrimental to the outcomes of characters when the reality of a situation is revealed. These illusions are revealed through Pip, a lower class boy caught in the struggle of the social classes of 19th century England. Throughout the book, Charles Dickens emphasizes the difference between appearance and reality through Pip's expectations of something better, social status, and settings in the book. The most important illusion Great Expectations is Pip's confident expectations of a better life. Pip began the book out poor, and was sent for to spend time every week with an upper-middle-class crazy woman and her heartless adopted daughter, Estella. From the moment he met Estella, he was in love with her. Later on in the book, he was provided with financial support from an un-named benefactor that should be used to go to London and become a gentleman. Pip assumed that Ms. Havisham, Estella's adoptive mother, was the benefactress. "My dream was out; my wild fancy was surpassed by sober reality; Miss Havisham was going to make my fortune on a grand scale." This was the reality that Pip had invented for himself, although it was really just a misimpression that his mind had created for himself. Because he thought that Ms. Havisham was his benefactress, Pip anticipated that Estella was meant for him. "I was painting brilliant pictures of her plans for me. She had adopted Estella, and had as good as adopted me, and it could not fail to be her intention to bring us together." "She reserved it for me to restore the desolate house, admit the sunshine into the dark rooms, set the clocks a-going and the cold hearths a-blazing, tear down the cobwebs, destroy the vermin, -- in short, do all the shining deeds of the young knight of romance, and marry the princess.... I had made up a rich attractive mystery, of which I was the hero." This is a very obvious illusion of what Pip anticipates for the future. When the reality of this illusion was revealed, Pip 2000-03-01T13:00:00-05:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-1716.aspx Great Expectations Of the major themes from Charles Dickens novel "Great Expectations" to be discussed as to their importance concerning its structure, I have selected "Love" in the context of human relationships, "Isolation" and finally "Redemption". The loneliness isolation brings can only be redeemed by the loving associate of our fellow man, this is a two way thing. "Had grown diseased, as all minds do and must and will that reverse the appointed order of their maker." In isolation the greatest sin we commit against ourselves and others, is to shun human companionship as Miss Haversham did. After her betrayal in love she hardened her heart towards her fellow man. By hardening her heart and suppressing her naturally affectionate nature, she committed a crime against herself. Miss Havershams love for Compeyson is of a compassionate kind, this blinded her to his true nature, as Herbert remarked, "too haughty and too much in love to be advised by anyone." At Compeysons desertion her anger and sorrow became extreme and she threw herself and Satis House into perpetual mourning and a monument to her broken heart, shutting the world out and herself from the world. Her only concession is in her adoption of Estella. Miss Haversham has ulterior motives in adopting Estella, this is not a loving action on her part, but a calculated manoeuvre to turn the child into a haughty, heartless instrument of revenge against men. Estella is encouraged to practice her disdain on Pip and to break his heart. Paradoxically, Miss Havershams greatest sin, is against herself. By hardening her heart she loses her generous, affectionate nature and becomes withered inside emotionally. Her punishment is that the heartless young woman she has made, uses her lack of feelings against Miss Haversham. Estella herself is isolated, as for most of the novel she takes pleasure in her role of avenger. Her isolation is in part responsible for Pips snobbery and his estrangement from Joe and Biddy. Like Miss Haversham she becomes a victim of her own machinations. She enters into a loveless marriage to Drummle, who is cruel to her. This shows that no matter how heartless one tries to be, there is always someone more heartless. The instrument of revenge punishes the avenger and is punished in return. Pip feels emotionally and geographically isolated on his arrival in London. Jaggers isolation is his deliberate rejection to human involvement, he substitutes these with the mechanical process 1999-11-24T13:00:00-05:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-1277.aspx Great Expectations There are many common, familiar cliches about illusion versus truth. "All that glitters is not gold" and "Things are seldom what they seem" are the most universal hackneyed phrases, but they do not cover entirely every aspect of appearance versus reality. In Charles Dickens' novel, Great Expectations, there are several differences between the illusion and the truth. The appearance of certain things is often detrimental to the outcomes of characters when the reality of a situation is revealed. These illusions are revealed through Pip, a lower class boy caught in the struggle of the social classes of 19th century England. Throughout the book, Charles Dickens emphasizes the difference between appearance and reality through Pip's expectations of something better, social status, and settings in the book. The most important illusion Great Expectations is Pip's confident expectations of a better life. Pip began the book out poor, and was sent for to spend time every week with an upper-middle-class crazy woman and her heartless adopted daughter, Estella. From the moment he met Estella, he was in love with her. Later on in the book, he was provided with financial support from an un-named benefactor that should be used to go to London and become a gentleman. Pip assumed that Ms. Havisham, Estella's adoptive mother, was the benefactress. "My dream was out; my wild fancy was surpassed by sober reality; Miss Havisham was going to make my fortune on a grand scale." (154) This was the reality that Pip had invented for himself, although it was really just a misimpression that his mind had created for himself. Because he thought that Ms. Havisham was his benefactress, Pip anticipated that Estella was meant for him. "I was painting brilliant pictures of her plans for me. She had adopted Estella, and had as good as adopted me, and it could not fail to be her intention to bring us together. She reserved it for me to restore the desolate house, admit the sunshine into the dark rooms, set the clocks a-going and the cold hearths a-blazing, tear down the cobwebs, destroy the vermin, -- in short, do all the shining deeds of the young knight of romance, and marry the princess.... I had made up a rich attractive mystery, of which I was the hero." (252) This is a very obvious illusion of what Pip anticipates for the future. When the reality of this illusion 1999-09-28T14:00:00-04:00 http://75.150.148.189/free-essay/Great-Expectations-1020.aspx