Jeremy Jacobs
Mr. Reese
English 9
15 February 2015
Once Upon a Time: Fairy Tale Motif in Great Expectations
With no serious distinction between child and adult morality, Charles Dickens builds Great Expectations with an underlying fairy tale motif, which has an important role in the novels structure. Following the cycle of the hero’s journey wheel, Pip comes across two mentors, one an heiress and the other a convict, who both act as typical characters in the standard fairy tale sorry. In the somewhat supernatural symbolism of the book, lies Miss Havisham, who, much like a wicked witch spun out of one of Hans Christian Andersen's fables, keeps Pip enthralled, employing Estella's beauty. Magwitch, the convict "boogeyman" and mysterious stranger,
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While this outward appearance seems to be true, in reality it is all a fraud; having sacrificed her life to memorialize her dead hopes, Ms. Havisham has frozen herself in time, wallowing away in her misery, and still wears her wedding dress with the clocks stopped at "twenty minutes to nine" (R), almost like a dark Snow White who is never to be awakened. The decaying feast and yellowing dresses represent what should have been in Havisham's life; in their preservation, they represent loss. In truth, Havisham is no fairy godmother;instead, she is a "witch" (r). Skeletal and like waxwork, she is the monstrous side of the female figure, and has raised Estella as a weapon to take revenge on men, as she has never let go the injustice of what her fiancée had done to her. Pip realizes Ms. Havisham's intent early on, hearing Ms. Havisham tell Estella to “break his heart” (r) while playing the game Beggar My Neighbor, but is smitten by Estella, and clings to the hope that Estella is meant to be with him. With the promise of adulthood and riches, Pip is entranced, imputing characteristics such as beauty and goodness onto Ms. Havisham, but looks past what Havisham really is: darkness, evil, a witch, and a …show more content…
Scaring Pip almost to death, he devours his food, taking "strong sudden bites" (R) in a way more doglike than human and imputes violence into Pip's life threatening to "cut [Pip's] throat" (R). First encountered in the graveyard , Magwitch is described as “fearful” dressed “in coarse gray, with a great iron on his leg” (r). Combined, Dickens presents a fairy tale-esque description like that of a classic monster. As a boogeyman figure in the novel, Magwitch manifests one of Pip's greatest fears: that Pip may one day turn out to be like Magwitch, someone he sees as so vile and disgusting he should never have been born. Pip already suspects he posses criminal qualities, and contact with Magwitch only exacerbates these fears, adding guilt into the
Human Failings in The Crucible Read this, if you have ever felt jealous, selfish, or are gaining the feeling of superiority, before you can cause a corruption of yourself. The quote from the prompt, written by Victor Hugo, is explaining how people in society are acting arrogant because they think they are better than everyone else are always put in their place for acting like that. In the book, The crucible by Arthur Miller, shows these negative feelings performed in different characters of the story. All these feelings are caused by different things, it almost makes us feel sympathy for the person who has them. I get these feelings once in awhile, but I have learned to push them back and just be happy with myself.
As if a ghost flew by, the woman was no longer her former self. She shielded herself with the snow, almost vanishing out of existence with no trace left behind. The woman was strange according to Charles Dickens. Yet only a few years later the white woman would inspire the character Miss Havisham. Miss Havisham is from a book called Great Expectations, the book was written by Charles Dickens during the Victorian era. In addition the book has many intriguing characters with their own intricate backstories. Character like Miss Havisham, Pip, and Magwitch. Each one of them are imprisoned by previous actions accompaned with mistakes.
Propaganda was the biggest influence in World War 2. It is the biggest reason why citizens of their respective countries were willing to enlist into their armies. Propaganda is information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view (Oxford Dictionaries). The posters that were made created an image in citizen’s heads that led them to believe that other countries were not only evil, but wild savages and would do anything to destroy every other country in the war. Chris Rudiger of Stanford University wrote about propaganda.
Rhetoric is all around us—it is everywhere—and people use and tailor rhetoric to benefit them, and the reason they do this is because each person has lived a life filled with struggle, heartbreak, challenges, happiness and bliss. The reason I bring this up is because understanding this will make teaching writing and rhetoric more effective; one of the things I enjoy doing is applying life to teaching because that will make an instructor more relatable. My research interest is heavily based on finding new approaches and strategies to teaching college English effectively that will appeal to a college audience—and I hope to experience this at Oregon State University.
Charles Dickens' novel, Great Expectations is the account of a young boy’s transition into adulthood as Pip, the central character, searches for contentment. Dickens uses Pip, a lower class boy, born into no particular wealth or distinction, he may have lived wholly satisfied with his modest pedigree had it not been for his association with Miss Havisham and consequently Estella. He was very self-centered and loved Estella, so he left all his loved one's who had all been there for him his whole life just to fulfill his own "great expectations" to achieve his own goals. Dickens also utilizes Ms. Havisham, a high class eccentric woman, who was jilted by her fiancé minutes before her wedding, and now she seeks revenge on all of mankind. She adopts a beautiful girl named Estella just for her revenge and to break Pip, a man's heart. In the novel, Great Expectations, Charles Dickens utilizes metaphors and negative diction to show how one's narrow-mindedness can prompt the destruction of their objectives and relationships.
Dickens emphasizes this with Magwitch's brutal behavior, his threats of death if Pip does not do his bidding, but, as is a recurring theme in the novel, we need only the proof of his appearance to pass judgment upon him. Pip in contrast is defenseless, for in the inverted position Magwitch holds him, Pip can be likened to a new-born; Pip is innocent, naked, and ignorant of the world. It is from this point Pip begins the long journey toward the "identity of things" (24; ch.1).
Pips fear of Magwitch grows when Magwitch says 'I ain't alone, as you may think I am'. Dickens does this to intimidate Pip even more and to make Pips experience with Magwitch as fearful and as memorable as possible. Magwitch then starts to go into great detail about what the other man can supposedly do. The description of the man kind of sounds like a ghost or horror story and Magwitch refers to himself as an 'Angel' compared to the other man. '
Throughout Dickens’ novel Great Expectations, the character, personality, and social beliefs of Pip undergo complete transformations as he interacts with an ever-changing pool of characters presented in the book. Pip’s moral values remain more or less constant at the beginning and the end; however, it is evident that in the time between, the years of his maturation and coming of adulthood, he is fledgling to find his place in society. Although Pip is influenced by many characters throughout the novel, his two most influential role models are: Estella, the object of Miss Havisham’s revenge against men, and Magwitch, the benevolent convict. Exposing himself to such diverse characters Pip has to learn to discern right from wrong and chose
The main storyline has to do with Pip’s expectations of becoming a gentleman. To do this he received help from a secret benefactor. For the first half of the novel Pip is convinced that Miss Havisham is the one doing this so one day he and Estella can be together. Dickens creates a story around Pip’s assumption to make this a very logical explanation. Coincidentally right after Pip realizes and confirms he was wrong about his benefactor, an unexpected character reappears. “You acted nobly, my boy,” said he. “Noble Pip! And I have never forgot it!” (Dickens 248) These words ring out of his benefactor’s name. Who appears to be the escaped convict from the beginning who threatened him, known by the name of Magwitch. Magwitch reveals that ever since that day in the graveyard when Pip returned to give him what he requested he has found a job to help Pip out for what he did for him. By doing this secretly for all this
4). Even though he aids the convict, the reader's sympathy for Pip soon increases, as his robbery of his own home weighs greatly on his conscience. For example, when Mrs. Joe leaves the Sunday dinner to retrieve the "savoury pork pie," which Magwitch had enjoyed heartily, Pip is tortured by the thought of his actions, while his mind screams, "Must they! Let them not hope to taste it!" (p. 27). He seems to sincerely regret his actions and the fact that he "had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong" (p. 40). Approximately one year after his encounter with the convict, Pip is still shown to be an innocent, caring boy. One night, when Pip and Joe are alone at the forge, Joe explains his various reasons for enduring Mrs. Joe's constant abuse. After their conversation, Pip realizes that he cares deeply for Joe and appreciates everything that the blacksmith does for him. Also, he develops "a new admiration of Joe from that night" and "a new sensation of feeling conscious that I was looking up to Joe in my heart" (p. 48). Unfortunately, as Pip develops unrealistic hopes and expectations for his life, these positive characteristics are replaced by undesirable ones.
There are salient junctures in Pip’s upbringing that make him who the person he was; this is a tale that in which Pip was soliciting for awareness of himself, as well he realized that his life had major elements of obscurity; due to the fact, he was presented clearly, two radical different lifestyle choices; one, involving a life as a blacksmith and the other; involving the path as life as am affluent prosperous gentleman. Dickens carefully wrote in the periods of Pip’s life and how those set of circumstances; affected by choice, as well affected Pip’s later choices he had made. The temptation of class and wealth perverted the actions of Pip and other people around him; Pip is therefore contemplating on how he was saved by reminiscence of the stages of his life. In the first stage; Pip encounters Magwitch; by accident, this affects the outcome of later events of his life; Pip is than introduced to Miss Havishism and Estella, he fell in love with Estella, and was dramatically persuaded by the promises he made to himself, from his encounters with Miss Havhishism and Estella. Dramatically; Pip than learned the truth about his wealth and that Magwitch was Estella 's father; this collapsed Pip’s vision of reality and forced him to alter his exceptions concerning the truth; Pip than had to save himself from his own selfishness, as well as his malice actions, to the ones who were faithful to him; finally, at the end Pip is a full grown adult and had gain
Great Expectations’ main character, Phillip Pirrip- generally known as Pip- had a rough upbringing as a child. His sister, Mrs. Joe had “brought him up by hand”, after their parents and five brothers had all been laid to rest many years ago. Another character, Herbert Pocket experienced a bizarre childhood, though in a different manner. Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations develops through the novel following Pip, a young “common boy” who grew up in the countryside. As he matured so did his love for a girl of higher class, Estella. However, being a common boy, Pip was not good enough for his Estella, thus once he was given an opportunity to become a gentleman in London he seized it without much hesitation. Charles Dickens’ had his own
As Magwitch eats, Pip describes him as the following: “the man took strong sharp sudden bites, just like the dog. He swallowed… too fast; and he looked sideways… while he ate, as if he thought there was danger in every direction of somebody’s coming to take the pie away,” (Page 19). With the use of alliteration on the “S”s and the use of harsh assonance when it says that “[he] took strong sharp sudden bites”, Dickens proves that Magwitch has a very aggressive nature as well as being very strong and threatening. Describing him as looking around every time he ate does not only show that it is the behavior expected of a convict while on the run, but also to emphasize the distance Magwitch keeps from society because of his distrust in everyone and everything. However, as a result of the concerns Pip had for Magwitch, Magwitch becomes humanized. In court, where Magwitch is denoted as a desperate criminal, he looks at Pip “with a trustful look, as if he were confident that [Pip] had seen some small redeeming touch in him, even so long ago as when [Pip] was a little child. As to the rest, [Magwitch] was humble and contrite, and [Pip] never knew him to complain” (Page 486). Using diction found in “redeeming touch”, Dickens verifies that Magwitch is redeemed from all of his criminal acts by his inner dignity and love for Pip.
and I, but to obey our instructions. We are not free to follow our own
The class system becomes a focal point in young Pip's life. Pip first began to think about his place in society when he was sent to visit the wealthy, old lady, Miss Havisham at her mansion. Through these visits Pip becomes socially conscious and begins to dislike his commonality. Almost instantly he wants to become uncommon. The adopted daughter of Miss Havisham, Estella, becomes a focal point and goal for Pip to obtain. Any morality Pip used to have slips away with each visit. Pip walks in circles in a barely lit room with Miss Havisam holding onto his shoulder and in doing so, Pip is somehow leaving behind all the values he was raised with. Miss Havisham and Estella end up corrupting Pip with the rich life. Greed, beauty and hubris are Pips downward spiral into an immoral life. Pip finds Estella very attractive, but Estella calls him common and this does not sit well with Pip. All of Pip's expectations of becoming a rich gentleman are due to this love of Estella.