340 Dickens, Charles
To learn that that was only in his imagination is a
serious blow.
Magwitch, too, has been gravely wounded by
rejection. Sent away by his country for a crime he
did not commit, told he must never return to En-
gland in his lifetime, Magwitch has experienced
what might be considered a mass rejection—the
rejection of his fellow English. He does well in
Australia, however, and uses his newfound wealth
to create an English gentleman, Pip, who will be
accepted, not rejected, by the society that has limited
them both so severely.
It is Miss Havisham, though, who experiences
that greatest rejection of all. Left at the altar by a
man she thought loved her, she spends her life in
mourning, literally surrounded by the symbols of her
rejection. She hardens her heart and passes this on
to Estella, her living instrument of revenge. When
she realizes, however, what she has done, and that
Estella is not just hard and cold to others but hard
and cold to her as well, she repents. For her, it is too
late, as she is at the end of her life.
But for Pip the lesson comes just in time. He
realizes that he has spent his life yearning for affec-
tion from those who cannot give it while ignoring
those who offer it freely. He returns to Magwitch
to help him escape, and although Magwitch dies in
the attempt, he dies knowing that he is accepted and
loved by his “second son.”
Jennifer McClinton-Temple
sOcial class in Great Expectations
Charles Dickens, more than any other writer of the
19th century, is known for his close attention to
social concerns, especially the welfare of children.
Many of his novels address issues of social inequal-
ity, child labor, and the living and working condi-
tions of the poor. In Great Expectations, Dickens’s
treatment of social class is more subtle than it is in,
for instance, oLiver twist, a christMas caroL, or
Bleak House. Here he gives us Pip, an orphan who is
not poor but whose options are limited by his place
and station in life. Pip is granted unexpected wealth
by one of the lowest of the low in English society,
Magwitch, a criminal virtually born into a criminal
state. While Pip’s character goes downhill as his
fortunes go up, Magwitch’s behavior is contrasted
with the behavior of the upper-class Miss Havisham
and her despicable relatives. Dickens seems to be
saying here that class does not determine character
and that, in fact, the social inequalities inherent in
English society serve no one well, not the poor and
not the rich.
The most honorable characters in the novel—
Joe, Herbert and Matthew Pocket, and Biddy—care
nothing for their own status and wealth. Joe and
Biddy may have been born into relatively low sta-
tions in life and therefore have little chance of
rising higher. But they are both extraordinarily
kindhearted people, focused outward, helping oth-
ers, rather than focused inward, helping themselves.
The Pockets are another matter entirely. Matthew
Pocket, born on the periphery of a wealthy family,
chooses not to compromise himself by kowtowing
to his rich cousin, Miss Havisham, as the rest of his
family does. The expectations that Joe, Biddy, and
the Pockets have from life are determined not by the
class in which they were born but, rather, by where
they find contentment and happiness.
The least honorable characters in the novel—
Miss Havisham and her relatives, Mr. Pumblechook,
and Bentley Drummle—demonstrate that wealth
and status do not make people kind or happy or
worthy of praise. They have been given opportuni-
ties in life, to be sure, and from life they have very
great expectations, but because they do not feel they
must contribute anything of their own to achieve
those expectations, they are empty shells, incapable
of true feeling.
It is the “in-between” characters in the novel,
those whose honor and expectations fluctuate, that
Dickens uses to make his strongest statements about
social class. Magwitch is born into what might be
called a criminal class. Pip asks him what he was
“brought up to be,” and Magwitch answers “a war-
mint, dear boy” as though that were a profession. He
remembers little of his early life but says his first
memory was of “a thieving turnips for my living.”
He remembers no parents, no home, no kindness
or warmth. He says of those who jailed him early
on in life, “They always went on agen me about
the Devil. But what the Devil was I to do? I must
put something into my stomach, mustn’t I?” This is
Dickens’s point: English society gave no chance to