The Cruel and Bitter Miss Havisham in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
At one point in the novel, Dickens tells the reader that Miss.
Havisham was a wonderful, beautiful woman and is considered to be a
great match. In contrast, when the reader first meets her she is a
frightful old woman who cares about nothing but herself. She is
determined to live her life in self-pity and seek revenge on all men.
In the novel, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, Miss Havisham is
established as a cruel and bitter old woman trapped in the past,
nearly a century ago, when she was abandoned on her wedding day, and
is now raising an adopted daughter to seek revenge on all men by
breaking their hearts however, near the end of the novel when she
converses with Pip about his love for her daughter over the years, it
is evident to her after that she has made a dreadful mistake and
changes most drastically before she dies.
"I had heard of Miss Havisham up town-everybody for miles round had
heard of Miss Havisham up town as an immensely rich and grim lady who
lived in a large and dismal house barricaded against robbers and led a
life of seclusion." Even before meeting Miss. Havisham the reader is
introduced to her and has an idea of what she is all about. Anyone who
lives secluded from society for years is going to be considered
eccentric. The town perceptibly gossips about her since everyone has
heard of her. The first time Dickens has the reader meet Miss.
Havisham is through Pip. The young boy is told to go visit her and
play and as he sees the house he describes it in bleak detail. As he
is led to Miss. Havisham through the dark halls by her daughter,
Estella, the tone of the house is set. There are cobwebs, antique
furniture, and clocks all stopped at twenty minutes to nine. Finally
Miss. Havisham is introduced. She is seen in her once white, now
yellow, wedding dress. All of this description, the old house, the
clocks, the wedding dress, explains how Miss. Havisham was left on her
wedding day many years ago and that was when her life stopped. She
even says as Pip is leaving, "There, there! I know nothing of days of
the week; I know nothing of weeks of the year. Come again after six
days. You hear?" Dickens creates the house and Miss. Havisham as a
unity. The condition and aspect of the house shows the gloom in her
mind. The way the house is dark is just fuel for her desire to seek
Filban said the home had a yard that was overgrown. “The trees and bushes were overgrown, and the house was dark,” Filban said. “And the windows were covered.” She and her sister slept in the front bedroom of the house. She remembers the bedroom having a large, floor-to-ceiling window. She said you could look out and see the wra...
By making the house have a topography and changing the perspective of the description, Malouf has created a sense of mystery and adventure in discovering the rooms for the first time from a child’s point of view. This sense is conveyed through describing the boy’s detailed observations and feelings when e...
The apartment is contrasted by both the bar and their new home. The bar is clearly seen as a symbol of the vices that keep us from taking hold of our dreams. In contrast, the new home is seen as a symbol of the fulfillment of those dreams. I am very pleased that the director was very thoughtful on navigating the restrictions that he faced in the use of different settings in the film to drive home the motifs that the original play alluded to so well.
A Theme during the beginning of the play is the value and importance of dreams. Each person in that house has a goal that they want to reach but is delayed in t...
Connected to the somber image of the town, The house is described with harsh diction such as “streaked with rust”, depicting the years of neglect. Affected by abuse, Petry describes the house as stained with “blood” in the form of rust. Despite the harsh outer layer, Lutie is drawn to it as her figurative and literal “sign”of refuge. A town that had been nothing but cold to her is finally seen as warm from the words on the sign; describing the house as “Reasonable” and open to “respectable tenants”.
When the story begins in “The House of Usher,” the narrator over exaggerates the description of the house in an attempt to explain his own disgust with the home. Reading Edgar Allan Poe’s stories seem to follow a pattern of dark feelings. His descriptions can give the reader an image in their head of a negative look and sets them up for a negative story. By writing about an eerie broken home such as “The House of Usher”, one could say the exaggerative descriptions are creating images that can depict the possible dreariness of a household. The dreariness may have consumed the residents of the household, which is mirrored in the state of the house. Poe has been said to have grown up in a broken home extending into a difficult childhood and deaths of his loved ones continuing to be a large portion of his life (Giammarco 28). By this mindset, a home can easily fall into a morbid trap of misery and unfortunate deaths. Poe’s drinking problem may also influence the way Poe may see home (Giammarco 22). An alcoholic may...
Description of the house follows, very high ceilings, old mansion it seems, with chimney stains, it has been let go. Jumps in time to narrators ex-husband making fun of narrators fantasizing about stains. The next paragraph is the father in a retirement home, always referring to things: ‘The Lord never intended’. This shows how old people have disdain for new things, the next generation appears to be more and more sacreligious. Shows streak of meanness when ‘spits’ out a reference to constant praying, narrator claims he does not know who he is talking to, but appears to be the very pious mother.
...ome the dream of attainment slowly became a nightmare. His house has been abandoned, it is empty and dark, the entryway or doors are locked. The sign of age, rust comes off in his hands. His body is cold, and he has deteriorated physically & emotionally. He is weathered just like his house and life. He is damaged poor, homeless, and the abandoned one.
(1265) along with other disturbing words to stress the mood of horror. Furthermore, the house evokes suspense as it strikes the reader with curiosity as to why the building presents such a dreadful and uneasy feeling. Poe describes the house with further detail emphasizing its ghostly traits: “Dark draperies hung upon the walls. The general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique, and tattered. Many books and musical instruments lay scattered about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene” (1267). Poe describes the house using very descriptive and daunting words contributing to the story’s depressive mood as well as its suspense.
doesn't see why she had to take him in and "bring him up by hand", she
Charles Dickens utilizes his life for inspiration for the protagonist Pip in his novel Great Expectations. They both struggle with their social standing. Dickens loved plays and theatre and therefore incorporated them into Pip’s life. Dickens died happy in the middle class and Pip died happy in the middle class. The connection Dickens makes with his life to Pip’s life is undeniable. If readers understand Dickens and his upbringing then readers can understand how and why he created Pip’s upbringing. Charles Dickens’ life, full of highs and lows, mirrors that of Pip’s life. Their lives began the same and ended the same. To understand the difficulty of Dickens’ childhood is to understand why his writing focuses on the English social structure. Dickens’ life revolved around social standing. He was born in the lower class but wasn’t miserable. After his father fell into tremendous debt he was forced into work at a young age. He had to work his way to a higher social standing. Because of Dicken’s constant fighting of class the English social structure is buried beneath the surface in nearly all of his writings. In Great Expectations Pip’s life mirrors Dickens’ in the start of low class and the rise to a comfortable life. Fortunately for Dickens, he does not fall again as Pip does. However, Pip and Dickens both end up in a stable social standing.
In the opening scenes of the story the reader gets the impression that the boy lives in the backwash of his city. His symbolic descriptions offer more detail as to what he thinks about his street. The boy says “North Richmond Street, being blind, was a quiet street [it’s houses inhabited with] decent lives within them, gazed at one another with brown imperturbable faces” (Joyce 984). This shows that the boy feels that the street and town have become conceited and unoriginal. While to young to comprehend this at the time the matured narrator states that he now realizes this. The boy is also isolated in the story because he mentions that when the neighborhood kids go and play he finds it to be a waste of time. He feels that there are other things he could be doing that playing with the other boys. This is where the narrator starts to become aware of the fact that not everything is what is seems. He notices the minute details but cannot quite put them together yet. As the story progresses one will see that th...
The mansion is a superb example and symbol of clairvoyance; it allows for great insight and perspective, furthermore, it is the one constant in the book. This allows it to greatly alter the story, even though it is an inanimate object that has no feelings, no thoughts, and cannot talk, but still says the most about everyone’s personality. It is an object that conveys true human nature, it does not care who everyone is, as they are all the same to it, and all it provides is a place to see and step back from reality to reflect on people’s actions.
The story begins as the boy describes his neighborhood. Immediately feelings of isolation and hopelessness begin to set in. The street that the boy lives on is a dead end, right from the beginning he is trapped. In addition, he feels ignored by the houses on his street. Their brown imperturbable faces make him feel excluded from the decent lives within them. The street becomes a representation of the boy’s self, uninhabited and detached, with the houses personified, and arguably more alive than the residents (Gray). Every detail of his neighborhood seems designed to inflict him with the feeling of isolation. The boy's house, like the street he lives on, is filled with decay. It is suffocating and “musty from being long enclosed.” It is difficult for him to establish any sort of connection to it. Even the history of the house feels unkind. The house's previous tenant, a priest, had died while living there. He “left all his money to institutions and the furniture of the house to his sister (Norton Anthology 2236).” It was as if he was trying to insure the boy's boredom and solitude. The only thing of interest that the boy can find is a bicycle pump, which is rusty and rendered unfit to play with. Even the “wild” garden is gloomy and desolate, containing but a lone apple tree and a few straggling bushes. It is hardly the sort of yard that a young boy would want. Like most boys, he has no voice in choosing where he lives, yet his surroundings have a powerful effect on him.
Similarly, the furniture in the house is as sullen as the house itself. What little furniture is in the house is beaten-up; this is a symbol of the dark setting. The oak bed is the most important p...