Great Expectations

Great Expectations, a Victorian novel by Charles Dickens, is sometimes considered to be a Bildungsroman. The novel follows the main character Pip’s development, which is thought by some to be a “snob’s progress”, as he grows as a person. Pip moves to London to become a gentleman, and his changes initially begin here. Pip soon becomes ashamed of his past and abandons everyone and everything that has once been there for him. But by the end of the novel Pip realizes that these changes are worsening him as an individual and feels extremely guilty. Pip’s social rise leads to his moral decline, which ultimately brings him back to the morals that he originally stood for.

The big city of London seemed extremely overwhelming to Pip at first. He is fascinated with the city but he is also terrified of its large size and busy atmosphere. He moved there to begin his transformation into being a gentlemen, and being in London instantly made him feel as if he already was one. This is where Pips changes begin and where he would spend the next period of his life figuring out whom he is and what he wants to do with himself. On page 81 Pip, regarding to his transition into a gentlemen, says “if you can't get to be uncommon through going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked." Pips first major change is how ashamed he is of Joe and Mrs. Joe, the two people who raised him. Pip is afraid that Estella, the girl who he becomes infatuated with, will find out about how he was raised and his past life and that she will look down on him. So Pip acts as if his past never happened, which is made evident when he says “there have been occasions in my later life (I suppose as in most lives) when I have felt for a time as if a thick curtain had fallen on all its interest and romance, to shut me out from anything save dull endurance any more” (124). Eventually Pip replaces his family with his “friends” in London.

Soon Pip befriends