It is a great human weakness to wish to be the same as our friends. If they are rich, we wish to be rich. If they are poor, then we don’t mind being equally poor. We are not ashamed of being stupid, we are only ashamed of being more stupid than our friends. It is a matter of comparison.
It is also a matter of expectation. We don’t miss things that we never expected to have. We are not disappointed at being poor if we never expected to be rich.
Pip is poor and uneducated, but so are his friends. For them, this is normal; this is what life is like. But when Pip is told that he has ‘great expectations’, he becomes dissatisfied. He is ashamed of his friends, and he is ashamed of himself. His expectations are in danger of ruining his life.
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Illustrated by: Susan Scott
Word count (main text): 24,045 words
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Pip
Joe Gargery, the village blacksmith
Mrs Joe Gargery, Joe’s wife and Pip’s sister
Mr Pumblechook, Joe’s uncle
Mr Wopsle, the church clerk, later an actor
Biddy, Mr Wopsle’s young cousin
Orlick, a blacksmith working for Joe Gargery
Abel Magwitch, a convict
Compeyson, also a convict
Miss Havisham, a rich lady
Estella, adopted by Miss Havisham
Matthew Pocket, Miss Havisham’s cousin
Herbert Pocket, his son
Clara, engaged to Herbert
Startop, a young gentleman
Bentley Drummle, a young gentleman
Mr Jaggers, a London lawyer
Molly, Mr Jaggers’ housekeeper
Mr Wemmick, Mr Jaggers’ clerk
The aged parent (the Aged), Wemmick’s father
Miss Skiffins, engaged to Wemmick
My first name was Philip, but when I was a small child I could only manage to say Pip. So Pip was what everybody called me. I lived in a small village in Essex with my sister, who was over twenty years older than me, and married to Joe Gargery, the village blacksmith. My parents had died when I was a baby, so I could not remember them at all, but quite often I used to visit the churchyard, about a mile from the village, to look at their names on their gravestones.
My first memory is of sitting on a gravestone in that churchyard one cold, grey, December afternoon, looking out at the dark, flat, wild marshes divided by the black line of the River Thames, and listening to the rushing sound of the sea in the distance.
‘Don’t say a word!’ cried a terrible voice, as a man jumped up from among the graves and caught hold of me. ‘If you shout I’ll cut your throat!’ He was a big man, dressed all in grey, with an iron chain on his leg. His clothes were wet and torn. He looked exhausted, and hungry, and very fierce. I had never been so frightened in my whole life.
‘Oh! Don’t cut my throat, sir!’ I begged in terror.
‘Tell me your name, boy! Quick!’ he said, still holding me. ‘And show me where you live!’
‘My name’s Pip, sir. And I live in the village over there.’
He picked me up and turned me upside-down. Nothing fell out of my pocket except a piece of old bread. He ate it in two bites, like a dog, and put me back on the gravestone.
‘So where are your father and mother?’ he asked.
‘There, sir,’ I answered, pointing to their graves.
