Shall we read "Great Expectations"?

[Túrin Turambar]

Late to the party, but anyway:

The very first scene, in the graveyard, drops us hard into the orphaned Pip’s world. Almost immediately, on only the second page, we, and Pip, are shocked and frightened by the convict who threatens Pip. ( And more frightened by “the young man” the convict speaks of, who will cut out Pip’s heart and liver and fry them for his breakfast.)

Before I read GE, my only Dickens experience had been A Christmas Carol. As such, I was struck by the darkness of the first scene – a boy is visiting the graves of his parents when a man grabs and threatens to dismember him.

It’s notable how Dickens blends comedy with pathos. GE is quite a dark book, but it has many funny moments.

Another point that I want to make is about Dickens’ style. It can seem odd and dense to a modern audience, but Dickens’ contemporaries found it very entertaining. I didn’t pick it up at first, but when I got into the rhythm I understood why he was so popular.

Yes, we have to take Miss Havisham with a grain of salt, I think. She is one of the Dickens things I never loved.

Really? I found her fascinating, and read avidly every scene she appeared in. Definitely one of Dickens’ most imaginative creations IMHO.

As a side note, I read GE a year or so ago. I'll follow this thread to see if others pick up anything that I've missed.

[Cerin]

My complaint about Faramir and to some extent about Aragorn was, we did not know what made these men the people they were. I wanted an explanation, some explanation, of how Faramir could casually push away the temptation of the Ring

I've never understood this complaint about Faramir and the Ring. Faramir never saw the Ring.

I wonder if people tend to forget that the Ring initially ensnared by sight or by touch. I've always thought that a more obvious concern, if people are wondering about a lack of Ring effect, is why members of the Fellowship were not more obsessed with it.

But I think this is consistent with Ring mythology, too, because it seems to me that people are most vulnerable to being ensnared by the Ring when caught unawares, and members of the Fellowship were minutely informed as to its evil at the Council before they every laid eyes on it during that brief moment when Frodo held it up.



But getting back to Dickens, I am making slow progress again, and I find the writing to be so full, simply brimming with witicism after witicism and astute observations about the human condition. I like young Pip so much; he has such a tender conscience and sweet innocence. I was really dismayed, though, that he so readily accepted Estella's view of him. That does not portend well.

[vison]

Ah, you see Our Pip as Dickens saw him, and as I see him. That's lovely.

Dickens could be awfully verbose. He could ramble and meander. He could certainly be over-sentimental (at least to our modern sensibilities). But when he was good, there was just no one better. One of the kewlest scenes (IMHO) in English literature is in "Bleak House" where he talks about a dog the characters see on the street. Was the dog necessary to the plot? Not at all. Just a bit of scenery. And if you read it, you will SEE that dog as clearly as if he was in the room with you. A "throwaway" bit, some people would call it, but I call it a Gem, a little treasure tucked in amongst the Big Things. And the "unimportant" characters, like the soldier's wife, also in Bleak House. That picture of a good and happy marriage is wonderful, amusing, touching and "realistic" enough that Mr. and Mrs. Soldier (can't recall their names right now) instantly join the ranks of literary friends like Pip and David Copperfield and Lily Dale and Mrs. Bishop Proudie.

[Cerin]

You can definitely count me a Dickens fan. These are some of the most wonderful sentences I have ever read. I think the force of the descriptive text is extraordinary; and such unique characters and situations, and always the continual insights into the human condition. (I wonder why it took me awhile to get into it; perhaps it just took time to get used to the writing style?)

Unfortunately I'm not nearly caught up to hobby yet (or perhaps she has finished by now).

[vison]

Cerin, I'm so glad you have become a Dickens fan. I think Bleak House should be next, now that you've cut your teeth on the style, so to speak.

[truehobbit]

Cerin, I've still got a hundred pages to go.

I'm liking Pip better as he gets older, although Herbert was a disappointment in his reaction to the convict - I had thought he was wiser than Pip in soul as well as mind.

I've not had time to put anything in words, and it's more fun if you're not the only new reader anyway.


I just wanted to say that I've just now found my copy of Great Expectations!!!

Remember how I was saying I knew I had one, only couldn't find it, and finally gave up, thinking I must have been wrong?

Turns out, I remembered the wrong publisher (hence was looking for a different colour cover), and didn't think it would be in the place where I just found it.

But as I was putting back my copies of A.A. Milne's poems just now, after having looked up something for another thread, and moved one of the many knick-knacks that adorn my shelves back in place, I saw it. Right in front of my eyes on one of the "classics" shelves, at best viewing height.


Well, at least I wasn't hallucinating about owning a copy, that's some comfort.

[Aravar]

Books hide from you.

The trick is to pretend to start looking for a different book. The book that you are actually looking for will think it is safe and peep out from its hiding place. Then you can pounce.

It works every time.

[truehobbit]

Seems to be true!

Thanks for the tip, Aravar! (And good to see you again. )

[truehobbit]

Well, I made it!

I finished Great Expectations, and really enjoyed the story, although I thought the writing was exceedingly clumsy at times. (Maybe I'm just spoiled by the excellent German translations that are around - most of my reading of Dickens has been in German.)

I stand by my view that Dickens is amazingly hard on his hero. I find this quite unusual, compared to all other Dickens novels I've read (ok, that's only around half a dozen, so not all that much to compare to, I guess, but still...). GE presents us with a hero who is flawed to a degree that is rarely found in what I remember of other Dickens stories.
I would venture to say that the fact that other readers here don't find this noticeable may have to do with our being used to finding flawed (and even severely crooked) characters as heroes of modern books.
Some evidence for this interpretation can in my opinion be found in the ending of the story. (Which, btw, contrary to other parts of the story, I found excellently written.)


SPOILER WARNING!



One of the features Dickens is most reputed for is the "poetic justice" of his endings. His characters get "what they deserve", according to Dickens's own and the Victorian ethics of his time. Thus, the convict cannot outlive the end of the story, but is granted a peaceful death as a sign that his "sins" are forgiven (though not forgotten enough to grant him surviving the story).

Pip (and I claim that this is as a result of his failings) has to serve 11 years in solitary exile (so to speak - mitigated however by the presence of friends, who are good people and a good influence on him) to atone for his ingratitude and arrogance, even though he has changed from this by the end of the story and his friends have forgiven him, before he can find his own happy ending.

Joe gets Biddy and Biddy gets Joe - I remember when I saw the movie that I was disappointed with the ending, and in the middle of the book I was again hoping that Pip might wake up and love Biddy and have a happy ending. But getting towards the end of the book, it was clear that Pip's dreams of life with Biddy were delusional - he would not have been able to be happy with her. I was very pleased to see my two favourite characters of the book, Biddy and Joe, united in marriage at the end.
(Yeah, I'm a sucker for the good guys. )

There is, however, one truly amazing end for a character here: Estella.
Are there any other instances in Dickens where a previously married female character gets a second chance at happiness?
I thought it was amazing that her former cruelty is forgiven not only as having been induced by Miss Havisham in the first place, but also as atoned for by her suffering from a brutal husband.
But she is still 'tainted' (in the Victorian view) - and so we don't actually see the happy end. We are only led to expect it by Pip, and are informed that for Estella it will be quite the surprise, too (as we, Victorian readers that we are in Dickens's mind, would find it a bit too much if we heard such a woman actually expected any happiness).

This is an odd story, and there's one more oddity (to me) in the resolution: Herbert getting his living "in the East". Often, emigrating is as much a punishment as a reward in Dickens. Characters who have failed but are forgiven may get a new start abroad (think of Steerpike's victim from David Copperfield - can't remember her name right now - Emily? and her father). Living in hot climes, away from England, is not really the fulfillment of all dreams for a Dickensian hero, I think? So, why does Herbert get sent away?
Sure, we hear he's successful, he lives there (wherever it is) with his wife, he's happy enough (why don't we hear whether he's got kids?) - but still... I liked Herbert, and I find the resolution of this part of the plot, well, not unsatisfactory, but inexplicable.

Some final thoughts to be drawn from these combinations, before I'll leave it at that: Pip and Biddy vs Pip and Estella
Even if Pip had developed a sincere love for Biddy instead of just a desire for ease to fuel his dream of life with her - would she have been suitable?
Had Pip not risen too high in society, so that Dickens was forced to deny any real feelings in him for her?
And that even though he had of course not really risen - all his status, his "expectations" had been void. He had been raised above his station (as contemporary texts would say), but it's no fault of his that it was void. So, how apt that his designated partner should be a woman of no family at all, but genteelly raised - exactly like him, really.

I thought this was an amazing story, much different from other Dickens novels, but the more fascinating for that. And I wonder whether this was a particular phase of Dickens's development as an author or just one tale that is somewhat odder that others.

[vison]

Did you know that Dickens wrote TWO endings to the story and you have only read one, by the sound of it?

[truehobbit]

Well, of course I've only read one - even if there are two endings, a book will have to choose one.

I'll have a look at my Penguin copy (the one that mysteriously reappeared on my shelf a few weeks ago) - they tend to be more scholarly, so that'll have something on that, I'm sure.

[truehobbit]

Yes, this copy had an appendix about the original ending.

You've led me to expect much more severe differences, my dear vison!

So, originally Dickens agreed with me (in my capacity as representing a Victorian reader ) that neither Estella nor Pip were deserving of any personal fulfillment in a happy ending and only wrote the little we have because Bulwer-Lytton persuaded him.
The Penguin copy also said, though, that except for once this 'original' ending is never used, and that although it fits the earlier tone and premunitions of the story better, the 'new' ending is in better harmony with the mood at the end and just more satisfactory all round, and I agree.

I think this incertain happy end is ideal: we get the promise of a future, but for all we know, there might not be one after all - in that, the ending reminded me a bit of Charlotte Bronte's books (the two that I've read). It was a bit as though Dickens was saying: dear reader, if you wish to imagine a happy ending, I'll let you (I'm just not exactly saying there was one).

[vison]

Well, of course I've only read one - even if there are two endings, a book will have to choose one.

I'll have a look at my Penguin copy (the one that mysteriously reappeared on my shelf a few weeks ago) - they tend to be more scholarly, so that'll have something on that, I'm sure.

Many modern copies include both endings, with an explanation. I'm somewhat surprised that yours didn't.

[truehobbit]

The one I read was "Penguin Popular Classics" - they cost two pounds a copy, and you can't expect a learned annotation for that.

However, I do also have the standard Penguin edition, and that had an appendix - see my post above.

[Cerin]

I noticed that another group read has started, and that prompted me to get back to finishing this. Of course, now I'll probably just be talking to myself.

I found I was uncomfortable with the attack on Mrs. Gargery. It reminded me of the ubiquitous device in movies today, wherein our hatred for an odious villain is cultivated through a movie so that we can cheer when they come to an ignominious and bloody end. I wondered if I was supposed to feel glad that Mrs. Gargery had been thus subdued?

[Cerin]

What an intro to London! *shudder*

Mr. Pocket's sweet-tempered corrections of Pip's table manners were delightful; and such a clever way to describe Pip's backwardnesses.

[Cerin]

The description of dinner at the Pockets'!

Honestly, it is one priceless vignette after another. Is Dickens always this funny? And that Mrs. Pocket! Next to her, Mrs. Bennet is a wise and virtuous woman.

At the beginning of the book, I found the colorful characters and unusual circumstances somewhat outlandish. But on continuing I see that within those larger than life parameters, there is a continual and wonderfully delicate exposition of the ordinary.

I wonder if it is especially hard to translate Dickens? It seems much of the subtlety -- and what subtle observations and wit! -- would be lost.

[Cerin]

London Pip remains in my eyes the same sweet, good-natured (confused since Estella) person he's been throughout. I gauge this by his kind and loving reaction to other kind and loving people (thinking particularly of Herbert, and Wemmick on his home front). One has only to imagine a truly pretentious and snobby person's reactions to the London people and situations to know that is not the essence of Pip. Then there is that sense that the story is tinged with the wry and self-deprecating assessments of hindsight, so that even as Pip's vanity is exposed -- if that's a correct way to name the Estella-induced desperation to distance himself from his past -- we are vaguely aware that he repents it.

Jaggers makes me queasy. He treats Pip and the others as though they are lab specimens. Is he up to something?

A meeting with Estella approaches. I wonder if she has improved over time (presumably farther removed from Miss Havisham's influence)?

[Impenitent]

Cerin, I'm really enjoying the view from behind your lenses. It is lovely to watch the book opening itself to your new eyes.

[Cerin]

It is so kind of you to post, Imp. One can feel a bit foolish talking to no one.

I'm not sure why I'm posting now that the others have moved on. I guess because I'm so taken with the book. I don't think I've ever seen such skillful use of the language, and I wish to exclaim.