Great Expectations

The setting of the novel is early 19th century England, namely the capital city of London and the southeastern county of Kent. Pip, a young orphan living with his older sister and her husband Joe, sits in a churchyard contemplating his parents’ tombstones. Suddenly, an escaped convict from the Hulks (prison ships) snatches Pip and demands that he bring him food/drink and a file to remove the iron encasing his leg. Pip obeys. He later witnesses the convict’s recapture.
One day Pip is taken by Uncle Pumblechook (who is actually Joe’s uncle) to the house of the rich but eccentric Miss Havisham. During his visit, he meets a beautiful girl named Estella, who treats him harshly and condescendingly. However, he becomes infatuated with her and wishes to win her favor by proving his worth and becoming a gentleman. He expects that Miss Havisham is planning to make him a gentleman and marry him to Estella, but instead, she decides to arrange for him to be apprenticed to Joe, a blacksmith.
Pip is discontent with his work in the forge, struggling to be educated properly with the help of his long-time friend Biddy and having hostile confrontations with Joe’s assistant, Orlick. One night, while she is alone in the house, Pip’s sister is viciously attacked and is rendered mute and disabled. The police are unable to find the attacker, but Pip suspects that it is Orlick.
One day, a lawyer named Jaggers appears and informs Pip that an anonymous benefactor has granted him an enormous fortune, and that he must come to London to begin his education as a gentleman. Pip happily accepts and immediately assumes that Miss Havisham is his benefactor and that she means to have him marry Estella.
In London, Pip becomes friends with Herbert Pocket, a gentleman ...

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... the river, but the police catch them with Compeyson’s help. Magwitch accidentally drowns in the river. Magwitch is given the death sentence, and Pip loses his fortune. Magwitch dies peacefully before his sentence can be carried out.
Pip becomes very sick and Joe cares for him in London, mending their relationship. Joe informs him that Orlick is in prison, Miss Havisham has died, and Biddy has taught Joe to read and write. After Joe leaves, Pip decides to return home and marry Biddy, but when he arrives he discovers that she has already married Joe.
Pip decides to work abroad in the merchant trade with Herbert. Returning many years later, he meets Estella in the abandoned garden at Miss Havisham’s house. Drummle abused her as her husband, but he has died. Estella is now kind instead of cruel, and the two leave together, Pip believing that they will never part again.