Charles Dickens builds Essay

Great Expectations is a play written by the famous novelist Charles Dickens in the mid 1800’s. Great expectations is set in the early Victorian times this was a time were great social changes took place. This was when there were big differences between the rich and the poor and if you did not have money, you were not treated the same way as if you did. Charles Dickens tried to educate the poor about the differences in society and the divides between rich and poor through his novel. Books in those days were accounted as luxuries and only the rich had luxuries as they could afford them, therefore the poor people never got to read the books that were published. Charles Dickens on the other hand wrote his whole novel in parts, these were then published in a weekly magazine called â€Å"All The Year Round† Dickens may have done this so that both the rich and the poor could read his novel. Great expectations is all about a little poor orphan called Pip and how his life is changed from being poor to rich, throughout the play we see Pip change as in the middle of the play he becomes a person of great expectations as a unnamed benefactor (Abel Magwitch) pays for him to be a gentleman. The novel Great expectations tends to reflect the life of Charles Dickens himself and is fairly autobiographical as at a very young age Charles was sent to a blacking factory as his father was deeply in debt due to this Dickens’s whole family went to debtors prison. Charles was then sent off to work in a blacking factory to pay off his father’s debts. Later on in life after Dickens father was released Charles went back to school and as he grew up he finally became a very famous novelist. This reflects on how Pip is a poor orphan who has no money and less if no education is sent to London to become educated and become a gentleman due to an unnamed benefactor. In Great Expectations, Pip is the main character as the whole novel is based around him and his life. He is both the central character, whose actions make up the main plot of the novel, and the narrator, whose thoughts and attitudes make the reader’s view about the story. In the beginning of chapter one, we see Pip standing alone in a marshy churchyard in front of seven gravestones when he suddenly is confronted by Abel Magwitch an big, scary escaped convict who has an iron shackle on one of his legs. Magwitch grabs hold of young Pip and turns him upside down looking for food but only finds a loose crust of bread from within his pockets. Magwitch then threatens Pip by saying to him that he will tell a person that he knows which will grab him and take his liver out wherever he is, if he does not listen to him. Pip is very innocent and naà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ve and believes Magwitch’s threats and in fear accepts the deal of bringing him some food and a file so that he can take the iron shackle off. As Pip returns home and next the day early in the morning gets up to take some food and a file to Magwitch. Whilst Pip is stealing the food and the file we find out the he has a very strong conscience as when he is taking the food out the cupboard he hears voices ‘Mrs Joe wake up wake up’ also when Pip has the left the house and is on the way to marshes he hears the animals the cow the horse saying ‘catch that thief catch that thief’. This makes the opening chapter very interesting and effective as we do not really know much about Pip and we know nothing about Magwitch the escaped convict. Charles Dickens builds up a lot of tension as when Pip is stealing the food we do not know if he is going to make it or if is he going to be caught on the way. Throughout the play Pip changes in character a wide range as first he is a very innocent and kind hearted child and later on in the novel we see a different side of him as when he comes for his sisters funeral he doesn’t want to stay at his old house instead at a posh hotel at this time Pip is a snob and dislikes his family as they do not have social manners and not a lot of money. Pip always had the desire to marry Estella and become a member of a social class by being educated and a gentleman Near the end of the play we see Pip and see what the real important part is being honest and good hearted not rich and arrogant. Magwitch is the second character we meet his entrance is rather dramatic and at first he seems very scary as he is a convict. He threatens Pip to make him do work for him ‘I’ll cut your throat’. Magwitch seemed to be very violent as he grabs hold of Pip and turns him upside down looking for food also he sits Pip on a gravestone and scares him. Magwitch in the first chapters has a very effective effect, as he is criminal and is on the marshes, which indicate that he has escaped this makes him, look even scarier. Also as Magwitch is first introduced ‘he glared and growled’ giving an indication that he was very violent and a dangerous person. We start to see the softer side of Magwitch when he is caught and say that he stole the file and the mince Pie and doesn’t bring Pip into it As the play continued we later find out about more of the softer side of Magwitch and that he really is a good hearted kind person we find out about this when he is revealed to be Pip’s mysterious and unnamed benefactor and the reason for that being was that he gave food to Magwitch when he was on the marshes starving.