Re: Great Expectation

Charles Dickens (cdickens@RMPLC.CO.UK)
Thu, 31 Jul 1997 12:04:30 -0100 

My dear Miss Deanna,

  Perhaps you find it hard to understand "Great Expectations" because yours
is a society in which class is less important than it was in early
nineteenth-century England.  When his expectations are realised, Pip finds
it difficult to talk to Joe because he, Pip, is acquiring the manners of a
metropolitan gentleman, while Joe remains a country blacksmith,
working-class, or lower-middle-class at best, rough-hewn, unpolished.  Pip
fears his status as a gentleman will be undermined if his humble origins
become known, and finds that his way of life is out of harmony with Joe's.
It's as if a preppy bond broker on Wall Street were required to entertain
hillbilly relations in his Manhattan loft.
  Wemmick is a complicated character.  He adjusts to the world in which he
works, indeed flourishes in it, but retains his human decency thanks to the
cottage in Walworth, his love for the Aged P, and his wooing of Miss
Skiffins.  Wemmick is never quite sure what advice and guidance he should
give Pip, that of a worldly-wise lawyer's clerk who knows human depravity,
or that of a loving decent family man.  Pip's fondness for Wemmick is
troubled by his perception of the contrast between his treatment of Joe and
Wemmick's treatment of the Aged.  That's why the relationship between them
is hard to understand.

Faithfully yours,


Charles Dickens
________________________________________________________________________________


>Dear Mr. Dickens,
>    I am writing you because i have many questions about your novel call
>GREAT EXPECTATIONS. My summer school call is reading that story right now,
>and i really dont understand it. I dont under stand why Pip doesnt talk to
>Joe anymore. I also dont under stand what is going on between Wemmick and
>Pip. If you could in your spare time tell me a bit more about these sections
>to help me understand it more. If you could I would like to get it my today
>sometime so that i can pass the test tomorrow.
>Thank you very much for your time
>
>LOVE Deanna
>
>

======================
Charles Dickens
charles_dickens@rmplc.co.uk
Author