Step inside Great Expectations

The film without the cuts. And the book itself.

A lonely orphan is seized among the graves by an escaped convict who demands food and a file — and swears him to secrecy.

9:41

The Cast

Pip / Philip Pirrip

Main · Gargery household; London gentleman-world

A marsh-country orphan whose wish to become a gentleman teaches him shame before it teaches him gratitude.

Locations

The marshes

marshland

Out on this flat wet emptiness a terrified boy meets the man who will shape his whole life.

Passage

A child names himself, and a lifelong identity begins with a mispronounced compromise.

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The Author’s Pen

Calling Myself Pip

My father’s family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.

Reading

Pip names himself, and that small fact quietly sets up everything to come. He cannot manage the full weight of his father's name, so he shortens it to something a baby's mouth can handle, and the shortened version sticks because he says it first. This is a boy defining who he is before anyone else gets the chance, which is fitting for a book about a man trying to make himself into someone grander than his beginnings. The self he starts with is a leftover, whatever was easy to say.

World Index

The Plot

The Convict on the MarshesSatis House and EstellaGreat ExpectationsLondon and New CompanyEstella and Pip's DeclineThe Return of MagwitchRuin and the RiverA Humbler Heart

The Cast

Pip / Philip PirripJoe GargeryAbel MagwitchEstellaMiss HavishamMr. JaggersWemmickHerbert PocketBiddyCompeysonDolge OrlickBentley DrummleMollyMrs. Joe GargeryMatthew PocketMrs. PocketClara BarleyMr. PumblechookStartopAged ParentMiss SkiffinsMr. WopsleMr. Wopsle’s great-auntTrabbTrabb’s boySarah PocketCamillaCousin RaymondGeorgianaBill BarleyMr. HubbleMrs. HubbleThe AvengerArthur HavishamClarriker

Locations

Barnard’s InnClara’s house near the riverJaggers’s house / dining roomJaggers’s officeJoe’s forgeLondonMatthew Pocket’s householdMiss Havisham’s room / feast-roomNewgate / courtroom spacesPip’s sickroom in LondonPumblechook’s premisesRichmondRuined Satis House grounds / gardenSatis HouseThe BatteryThe churchyardThe Gargery kitchenThe hulks / prison shipsThe marshesThe riverThe sluice-houseThe villageVillage school / Wopsle’s great-aunt’s schoolWalworth Castle

Objects of Note

Boats used in the escapeClarriker partnership papersEstella’s jewelsHousehold debts and furnishingsJaggers’s courtroom casts / criminal relicsJaggers’s soap / hand-washingJoe’s forge toolsLegal papers / office documentsLetters and warningsMagwitch’s leg-ironMiss Havisham’s crutch stickMrs. Joe’s apronMrs. Joe’s slatePip’s apprentice indenturesPlaying cardsStolen food / pork pieThe decaying wedding cake / feast-tableThe fileThe forge fireThe money / expectationsThe stopped clocksThe wedding dressTicklerWemmick’s drawbridge / castle apparatusWemmick’s portable property

Core Concepts

Gentility as moral misrecognitionLove as care versus possessionMoney as fantasy and contaminationMoral education through errorRespectability versus nobilityThe past returns

The Author's Pen

Parents Imagined From TombstonesPip In the ChurchyardThe Man Among the GravesTilted Into ObedienceFellow Sufferers and ConfidencesBread and Butter in ReserveStealing Food And A FileJoe Gargery in Strength and WeaknessBrought Up By HandThe Fingerpost and the HulksBreakfast Before the GallowsI Took HimThe Blacksmith’s Stolen VittlesToo Cowardly To Do RightJoe Reads His NameAshamed of JoeAt Miss Havisham’s GateThe Withered BrideEstella's First InsultKeeping Back TearsOne Memorable DayThat Means You Have WonAshamed Of HomeOrlick’s Hidden HostilityEither I Am Very StupidI Want To Be A GentlemanTo Gain Her OverA Young Fellow of Great ExpectationsThe Secret BenefactorJoe Wants NothingOffended By Kind LooksThe Old Shoes FarewellMr. Jaggers’s Dismal RoomThe First of My Great ExpectationsLaughing in Barnard’s InnNo True Gentleman At HeartOnly ProfessionalWemmick’s Little BatteryBentley Drummle IntroducedJoe in His Forge DressEstella Laughs At MeEstella Has No HeartLove Her If She Wounds YouTears Soon DriedNewgate on My ClothesWe Are Not FreeThe Fiction of EnjoymentTake Me As MadeI Made a GentlemanYour Second FatherCompeyson’s BusinessWhat Have I DoneThe Flaming RescueEstella’s FatherI’m a-Going to Have Your LifeBy Magwitch’s SideLoitering at the Temple StairsThe Face DisclosedTelling Him About His ChildJoe's Tender CareBiddy Married to JoeFriends Apart

Plot point 01

The Convict on the Marshes

A lonely orphan is seized among the graves by an escaped convict who demands food and a file — and swears him to secrecy.

Objects of Note

The file

A tool Pip steals from Joe to free a convict, and the start of a debt he cannot yet see.

The Cast

Joe Gargery

Main · Gargery household

A gentle blacksmith whose strength is most visible when he refuses to use it for pride.

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Great Expectations

Charles Dickens

The cast, locations, objects of note, core concepts, and selected passages in the Author’s Pen - at your own pace.

One of 127 classics in the Literah library

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