Page 188 - DENG404_FICTION

Fiction

Notes Pip obeys, but the fearsome convict is soon captured anyway. The convict protects Pip by
claiming to have stolen the items himself.
One day Pip is taken by his Uncle Pumblechook to play at Satis House, the home of the
wealthy dowager Miss Havisham, who is extremely eccentric: she wears an old wedding dress
everywhere she goes and keeps all the clocks in her house stopped at the same time. During
his visit, he meets a beautiful young girl named Estella, who treats him coldly and contemptuously.
Nevertheless, he falls in love with her and dreams of becoming a wealthy gentleman so that
he might be worthy of her. He even hopes that Miss Havisham intends to make him a gentleman
and marry him to Estella, but his hopes are dashed when, after months of regular visits to
Satis House, Miss Havisham decides to help him become a common laborer in his family’s
business.
With Miss Havisham’s guidance, Pip is apprenticed to his brother-in-law, Joe, who is the
village blacksmith. Pip works in the forge unhappily, struggling to better his education with
the help of the plain, kind Biddy and encountering Joe’s malicious day laborer, Orlick. One
night, after an altercation with Orlick, Pip’s sister, known as Mrs. Joe, is viciously attacked
and becomes a mute invalid. From her signals, Pip suspects that Orlick was responsible for the
attack.
One day a lawyer named Jaggers appears with strange news: a secret benefactor has given Pip
a large fortune, and Pip must come to London immediately to begin his education as a gentleman.
Pip happily assumes that his previous hopes have come true—that Miss Havisham is his
secret benefactor and that the old woman intends for him to marry Estella.
In London, Pip befriends a young gentleman named Herbert Pocket and Jaggers’s law clerk,
Wemmick. He expresses disdain for his former friends and loved ones, especially Joe, but he
continues to pine after Estella. He furthers his education by studying with the tutor Matthew
Pocket, Herbert’s father. Herbert himself helps Pip learn how to act like a gentleman. When
Pip turns twenty-one and begins to receive an income from his fortune, he will secretly help
Herbert buy his way into the business he has chosen for himself. But for now, Herbert and Pip
lead a fairly undisciplined life in London, enjoying themselves and running up debts. Orlick
reappears in Pip’s life, employed as Miss Havisham’s porter, but is promptly fired by Jaggers
after Pip reveals Orlick’s unsavory past. Mrs. Joe dies, and Pip goes home for the funeral,
feeling tremendous grief and remorse. Several years go by, until one night a familiar figure
barges into Pip’s room—the convict, Magwitch, who stuns Pip by announcing that he, not
Miss Havisham, is the source of Pip’s fortune. He tells Pip that he was so moved by Pip’s
boyhood kindness that he dedicated his life to making Pip a gentleman, and he made a fortune
in Australia for that very purpose.
Pip is appalled, but he feels morally bound to help Magwitch escape London, as the convict
is pursued both by the police and by Compeyson, his former partner in crime. A complicated
mystery begins to fall into place when Pip discovers that Compeyson was the man who
abandoned Miss Havisham at the altar and that Estella is Magwitch’s daughter. Miss Havisham
has raised her to break men’s hearts, as revenge for the pain her own broken heart caused her.
Pip was merely a boy for the young Estella to practice on; Miss Havisham delighted in Estella’s
ability to toy with his affections.

As the weeks pass, Pip sees the good in Magwitch and begins to care for him deeply. Before
Magwitch’s escape attempt, Estella marries an upper-class lout named Bentley Drummle. Pip
makes a visit to Satis House, where Miss Havisham begs his forgiveness for the way she has
treated him in the past, and he forgives her. Later that day, when she bends over the fireplace,
her clothing catches fire and she goes up in flames. She survives but becomes an invalid. In
her final days, she will continue to repent for her misdeeds and to plead for Pip’s forgiveness.

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