This was my second time reading this book but my first time reading it in English.
The pace is extremely slow (and some times boring), but one principal reason why this is such a good book is that it contains such memorable and colorful cast of characters, likable or not.
Dickens had a genius for creating believable and human characters.
This book reveals important truths about life and about humanity.
Who did not have delusional expectations while growing up? Delusions about love, about money?
Although I thought that the storyline was more like a fairytale (some events I thought were a bit unrealistic), its slow development is superb.
I found the writing a lot easier than I expected, but I did not realize that Dickens repeated the same words in the same sentence (I guess it’s a way to give more emphasis to the sentence or dialogue, or perhaps that’s how people used to talk).
I was simultaneously listening to the audiobook narrated by Martin Jarvis, who I thought did a terrific job. It really added that extra joy and a different pace to the book (as I have said on other reviews, I’m still not able to enjoy an audiobook on its own. I’m experimenting. Thank goodness for the public library!).
Now I want to watch the movie or TV adaptation (I have a couple of versions sitting on my shelves of DVD collection).

PS. This book was not meant to be read at once. It was originally intended for weekly publication. Great Expectations was divided into nine monthly sections, with new pagination for each, and released between December 1860 and August 1861.
A good reason to take it slow.

Excuse me for this infamous pun - which I'm sure has been wearily used since the book was first published -, but I had great expectations about it. Not only had I never read anything by Charles Dickens - who seems to be one of those polarizing authors that continues to inspire, decade after decade, a love/hate relationship with his readers -, but also because Great Expectations is regarded as one of his most important works. For someone as anxious as myself - I should really look into that - it seems expectations and anxiety are like non-identical twins: they're born together – or just few minutes apart from each other - but while the first born is a hopeful and optimistic attitude about something to come, his younger brother denotes an unpleasant state of inner turmoil, a sensation that his good twin may never come to fruition.

I expected Dickens's text to be dark and bleak, with touches of sadness and even over-sentimental at times. More, I expected a black and white - heavy, sluggish - Béla Tarr film. Because of that, I was anxious and feared that if I wasn't in the right state of mind or in a proper setting (which is a fair feeling, I guess: it's curious how much external variables - as the rain leisurely falling outside or infuriating noises of beeps and horns in a rush hour in traffic - can have effects on our most internal sensations; it's amazing how physical can also have control over psychological and the brain isn't always the commander in chief), I wouldn't be able to properly enjoy and absorb what the novel was about.

As it turned out with Great Expectations though, I really appreciated the book (whenever and wherever I spent time with it) and actually found the story to be humorous - as I caught myself giggling on more than three or four occasions - and even have a gothic touch - which I never supposed about it. Parts of the novel - volume 2, as to be completely clear - were harder to get through, which only came to add up to my initial concern about the remaining of the book.

Divided in three volumes, the book has different paces and approaches for each one: Volume 1, as it happens with every book we're starting to read, feels slower and more descriptive. We get to observe everyone - and the places, and people's manners - like we've just arrived to a party that's been famous for years and we've been anxious to attend to, still a little shy to go around meeting and talking to the other guests. Volume 2, as important as it was to determine Pip's character - and also for covering an important part of his life and setting the stage for the final and striking act -, I must confess, dragged a little bit and added to my anxiety that while I was enjoying the book, it might not have what it takes to carry it to the next level, to a great 5 stars book - and to think it was supposed to be twice as long! Volume 3, on the other hand, has a rapid pace and is surprisingly quite a page turner! Everything unfolds and we find out that the characters and events were a lot more connected than we could ever have suspected them to be and, because it was so masterfully written, it never felt like those common and overused cheap plot twists.

I expected Pip's great expectations to fail as I resented him and I intimately cheered that he wouldn't become a rich man because I worried he wouldn't do Joe and Biddy - always there for him, always his faithful companions - justice if his design and ambition to become a gentleman was successful. On the other hand, I never expected that Joe would turn his back when Pip needed him again, and I was glad to find out that Joe never did - it was never even an option for him.

I never expected that Pip's journey would be all about self-understanding and education: what first seemed to be a simple quest for society and financial triumph, turned out to be much deeper than I had anticipated at first. In offering Pip money, Magwitch thought he was doing his dear boy a big deed and changing his life for the better; eventually, what accomplished that was something much simpler: Magwitch's presence. Ashamed of the past - his life conditions, his friends, the house he lived in - Pip was all about living in the future, erasing his childhood and trying to write himself a future like he was writing a book - conversely, the book he ended up writing was all about his past. Ashamed of his relations with an ex-convict, initially he tried everything he could to avoid being associated with Provis, worrying about the damage it would do to his own reputation. As the story went on, Pip was able to reconnect with his past and free himself from all the shame, assuming Provis as his benefactor and fighting to save his life. Without realizing it, Pip was becoming a better person.

Like our narrator - a boy who would grow up to be a gentleman as opposed to a man who was unsuccessful for most of his life and looked down in society for being an ex-convict -, Estella is also a product of frustration, a creation of Miss Havisham: a girl who would become a heartbreaker to revenge Miss Havisham's own broken heart. It's interesting, to say the least, to follow their stories to find out if they'll be able to cut their puppets strings and become their own selves without having to comply to what was initially expected and planned for them and - as those expectations were blurred with what they wanted for themselves - unveil their free will to live on a future they could be active parts of.

There are two different endings to this story: Dickens's original intended finale and that which became the official one - although nowadays both are included in most of the editions published. On Dickens's original manuscript, Pip was to have a brief and random encounter with Estella, after being many years apart, where he would see that she had experienced sufferings in her own life and was lonely as himself:

n  "I was very glad afterwards to have had the interview for in her face and in her voice, and in her touch, she gave me the assurance that suffering had been stronger than Miss Havisham's teaching, and had given her a heart to understand what my heart used to be."n

After having his friend, also a writer, Edward Bulwer-Lytton to read the novel, he was then convinced to change the ending so it would be more romantic and not so much hopeless. The "new" ending, although being controversial for its many interpretations, implied that Pip and Estella would end up being together in some way or another - if not as lovers, at least as good friends:

n  "I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and, as the morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so the evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me, I saw the shadow of no parting from her."n

Although both conclusions work and are satisfying as far as my tastes go - and both are so beautifully worded as well! -, I prefer Dickens's original ending as it seems to be more consistent with the story, also more psychologically believable and less sentimental, less "everything works out perfectly in the end".

Rating: for what I was expecting - to not say, again, "my great expectations" - have been met with acclaim and success, 5 stars.

How? How? How did I get to the age of 40 without having read this novel? Better yet, in 1860, when the average person had not the wherewithal to take a bath, how did Dickens so profoundly understand the human condition? This novel is quite possibly the most tender tribute to friendship I have ever encountered in a single book. Great Expectations is incredibly modern and is filled with flawed and likable characters, realistic and break-your-heart friendships, mystery, romance, and redemption, redemption, redemption. Yes, the language is dated, get over it. This is a masterpiece and Pip, well, you've heard of Pip, he's always in the crossword puzzles. . . he's someone you should know.

Great Expectations. What a superb title this is; wonderful, in the best and truest sense of the word. It is upbeat, exciting, and full of intrigue. It quickens our pulse and gives us a little thrilling frisson. Who is it, who has these “Great Expectations”? We want to meet them. We want to share their anticipations and their pleasure. We are hooked into the story by these first two words.

Perhaps most significant of all is that it is a short, memorable title. Great Expectations is one of Charles Dickens’s latest novels, his thirteenth in fact, serialised weekly, in his newspaper “All the Year Round” in nine monthly sections between December 1860 and August 1861. It was also serialised in the US – oddly a few days before - and on the continent. Then Dickens’s publishers, Chapman and Hall, published the first edition in book form in three volumes in 1861, with five subsequent reprints, and a one-volume edition in 1862. Sadly Dickens had quarrelled with his great friend and illustrator Hablot Knight Browne, “Phiz”, so there are none of his quirky and instantly recognisable illustrations. The silver lining in this cloud is that there are a plethora of illustrations by other artists, both contemporaneous and later. They vary from the absurd, clearly mimicking Phiz’s caricatures, to increasingly ghastly ghouls, and stuffed shirt heroes. Some are darkly effective, capturing the gothic mood, but others make the reader yearn for Phiz’s perception and insightful eye.

Dickens was only to write more novel, “Our Mutual Friend”, plus an unfinished one, aptly named “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” (a mystery never to be solved, although plenty have tried).

By now Dickens was a master of his craft. He had abandoned the lengthy titles, which sometimes took up half a page and which are rarely used in full. He had also learned, wisely, that his public liked optimism. Other short titles such as “Hard Times” and “Bleak House” had preceded this one, but they reek of Victorian deprivation and hardship. They do not attract us in the same way, nor are they timeless in appeal, whereas the title Great Expectations could have been coined yesterday.

In other ways too this novel stands head and shoulders above some of the others which precede it. Dickens always had an eye to his popularity, and whereas “Bleak House” may well be his greatest novel, it is not, and has never been, his most popular. It is so weighty that it is in danger of toppling over, and many readers struggle with the complexity of it. There are several interwoven plots, and although it contains some of his finest writing, Dickens makes few concessions to those who prefer one strong thread to follow. Conversely Great Expectations has a streamlined plot which moves along at a good pace. We are mesmerised by the forceful characters, and crave desperately to unravel the mysteries. It could be argued that of Dickens’s novels, Great Expectations makes the greatest use of plot, characterisation and style, sacrificing a little of the dense maze of “Bleak House”’s annals for more urgency, a simpler story focus, and a strong sense of direction.

In Great Expectations Dickens returns to one of his favourite themes: the story of a young man, and how he grows and learns through his various experiences. It is at heart a bildungsroman, or “coming of age” story. Some of the best loved novels by Dickens follow this format, for instance, “David Copperfield”, “Nicholas Nickleby” and most notably, the hugely popular rags-to-riches story, “Oliver Twist”. Yet the difference in execution between these two is startling.

“Oliver Twist” is recognisably an early work by Dickens and has all his idiosyncratic features. It has a myriad of cameos, both comic and grotesque. It has a strong social conscience, humour, and tragedy. But it also has all the faults of a young writer fully on display. It is overful of hyperbole, with a cardboard hero who is well nigh a saint. It is overwritten. We are shocked at the social conditions, but swayed by the pathos rather than by the author’s writing skills. By the time of his autobiographical novel, “David Copperfield”, Dickens had honed his skills. In fact before embarking on Great Expectations he reread “David Copperfield”, fearing that he might unintentionally repeat himself.

With Great Expectations Dickens has reached his pinnacle. He has written a novel full of heartbreak and obsessions of various kinds, and the reader is putty in his hands. He has learned to control his expostulations; his declamatory outbursts, his overt theatricality, and therefore has written a much more gripping and persuasive novel.

This is a novel with everything you could want. There is adventure, excitement, horror and passion. There is madness and vast wealth beyond imagination, and a benefactor who is to remain mysterious until the denouement. There are vicious crimes, wife-beating and murders, duplicity and depravity, malicious cruelty, and characters crazed by love and obsession. There is humour, ridicule, absurdity - and overwhelming sadness and grief. It is, in short, a perfect Dickens novel. It is a gothic masterpiece. You will thrill to the horrors of Satis House and its half-crazed inhabitant. You will despair at the ineptitude of the hero, blinded by his passion for a young woman whose heart has been turned to stone. You will cry for the nobility of the steadfast Joe, wanting nothing for himself; only wanting to do what is right.

The central character is Pip, Philip Pirrip, plagued by his feelings of inferiority at his thick boots and coarse hands. He desires wealth and status, and for some part of the novel it looks as if he might be groomed for this. We do not have much compassion for Pip. He seems an insensitive, selfish and self-centred brat of a boy, for more than half the novel. Once destined to become a gentleman, Pip becomes increasingly arrogant and embarrassed by what he sees as his humble origins - and unforgivably casts off the man who had been his protector. We wonder how he will ever become the Dickens hero we feel he must inevitably become. For Dickens’s novels are not tragedies, although they have tragic elements among the mix. The deserving are usually rewarded in the end, and the cruel, wicked or manipulative characters usually suffer an ignominious fate. Dickens liked to please his readers; to make them feel life was as it should be. It reassured them that however messy their own lives were, things would work out alright for the heroic characters they had been reading about and championing in their newspapers, for over a year.

Is this then an exception? Do we have a “bad boy”; an anti-hero against the usual Dickens type? The answer is no. Dickens, once more, has used his skill and created a superb subtly layered novel. The novel is straightforward in its time frame, with events moving forward logically, except where there is some reported history which is usually crucial to move the story along, by one of the characters. But in among the intrigue and the action, we hear the voices of three Pips, and occasionally an omniscient narrator (and occasionally even Dickens himself, when he cannot resist giving an opinion or two, or poking fun at one of his creations).

Five voices? Surely then, it must be hard to read? And again, the answer is no. It moves seamlessly between the voices, yet they add a richness and depth. We know that Pip is to become a deserving character; an upright young man. And we know this because we see him there on the page, in every word that he narrates. We see the characters through his eyes, and we gain a full picture of them. We see the young boy’s impressions, doubts and fears; the older boy’s vanity, shallow ambitions and intolerance, and we see the older, wiser Philip Pirrip, now grown into his full name and maturity, and reporting as truthfully as he can on the vagaries of his youth.

And the story he has to tell thrills us. Dickens himself referred to it as “a grotesque tragicomic conception”. It is unbelievably grotesque and riddled with gloom, full of coincidences, with highly exaggerated vivid characters, yet we believe every word, and are compelled to keep turning the page. We soak up the darkly terrifying descriptions, and the ominous sense of place. We wonder - surely these places could not exist. Nor the characters? But yes, they could, and yes, sometimes they did.

Great Expectations begins in a churchyard where Pip’s family is buried, and where he is to have a devastating meeting with someone who strikes terror into his very soul. The churchyard is based on a desolate church in the village of Cooling, lying out among the marshes seven miles from “Gads Hill”, Dickens’s family home at that time. He describes Cooling Castle ruins and the marshes evocatively, imbuing the narrative with dark foreboding and menace. The young Pip, visiting his family’s graves, is very close to Dickens’s heart. As a young child himself, between the ages of 5 and 11, he had lived in Chatham, and this is only a couple of miles away from Cooling. In fact this is when he first admired “Gads Hill”, the house he was later to buy. These descriptions were all transcribed from memory – complete with the young child’s terror at the stark scene, the unforgiving bleak marshes, the sea, the swirling mists, wind and rain, the beacon of distant light, and the gibbet and chains.

These early scenes are very ghoulish, for instance as the stranger threatens to cut out Pip’s heart and liver, but they exemplify the morbid relish Dickens excels in. They are a perfect example of black humour, because the events are described from a child’s point of view, as he is almost petrified with fear. Even the tombstones of Pip’s siblings, the “five little stone lozenges”, is a light-hearted reference to something common enough, but really full of pathos and tragedy. Cooling churchyard actually contains not just five but thirteen child graves all together, from two families in the village who were related. Perhaps Dickens - unusually - toned this down, for fear of scepticism on the part of his readers.

Pip is brought up by his termagant of a sister, full of bitterness and self-inflicted martyrdom, knocking her husband Joe’s head against the wall or banging Pip’s head like a tambourine with her thimble. She is proud of having brought Pip up “by hand” - such a sarcastic double-edged phrase - making copious use of ��the Tickler” - such a gentle name for something which was capable of inflicting a great deal of pain! The lively and caustic descriptions make us smile, although the smile may well be a rueful grimace. Joe Gargery’s forge, incidentally, where Pip lives with them both, really exists. It is located at Chalk village in Kent. Dickens and his wife Catherine had stayed there on their honeymoon in 1836.

What about the historical facts; are they accurate? The answer is mostly, yes, although some dramatic license has been taken with the timing. Convicts in Britain were not actually sent to America any more at the time of Great Expectations. It had stopped in 1776, and after then they were sent to Australia. It is estimated that 140,000 criminals were transported to Australia between 1810 and 1852 and this is 8 years before this novel was published. Transportation was abolished in 1857, but was as the novel says, for life. If a convict ever returned to Britain, they were hanged (by law, until 1834), even though the original offences were sometimes quite minor by modern standards.

Dickens was also particular as to detail. There are two exciting and dramatic river scenes in the book, one at the beginning in the marshes, and an echo of it as the novel rushes headlong along the river to its climax. Dickens wanted to ensure that his description of the course of the boat was authentic under these conditions. In order to make absolutely sure, and perhaps explore further possibilities, he hired a steamer for the day of 22nd May 1861. The route was from Blackwall to Southend. Accompanying him on board were eight or nine friends, and also three or four members of his family. They all assumed Dickens was enjoying a relaxed summer day out, as he entertained them as usual. But in truth, his mind was working overtime, keenly observing and noticing every single detail. Nothing escaped his attention, as he made a mental note of what happened on each side of the river during the course of their journey.

The vast edifice, “Satis House”, home of the decrepit and grief-stricken Miss Havisham, was based on “Restoration House” in Rochester, Kent. Charles II had stayed there on his return to England in 1660, restoring the English monarchy after Oliver Cromwell. Dickens turned it into a crumbling ruin, full of cobwebs (and their menacing lurkers), rats and dust. The only light to be seen is Estella, the “star”, either as herself, or by the candle she bears amidst the gloom. Yet even now you can visit “Restoration House” if you choose, and marvel at how it was transformed into a temple of filth, ruin and chaos, rotten with decay and perversion, an almost living presence, when the master magician Dickens wove his spell.

So we see chapter and verse about the places. They do exist, yet the view of them here is unique and powerful, seen through Dickens’s eyes. We also know that he often liked to include people he knew in his novels, sometimes in homage, but with notorious or famous celebrities of his time, it was more often to poke fun at them. Are there any such in Great Expectations. Certainly there are, yes. Just think of the most likely character, the most over-the-top grotesque imaginable. Are you thinking of Miss Havisham, crazed by her grief and loss  who had vowed to wreak havoc on all mankind? For, incredibly, she is based on a real person.

She is very probably based on Eliza Emily Donnithorne of Camperdown, Sydney, Australia. Miss Donnithorne was a recluse and an eccentric. She had been jilted on her wedding day, and spent the rest of her life in a darkened house, leaving her wedding cake to rot, as it was on the table. She also left her front door permanently ajar, in case her groom ever returned.

At the time of writing this novel, Dickens was 48 to 49 years of age. His domestic life was in tatters, as it had rapidly gone downhill in the late 1850s, and he had now separated from his wife, Catherine. He was having a secret affair with an actress, the much younger Ellen Ternan, who could well be the basis for the character of Estella.

During the writing of Great Expectations, Dickens went on tour, reading and acting out parts of his immensely popular novels. In March and April 1861 alone, he gave six public readings. More like performances, they were very successful in every way, but it took a terrible toll on his health.

There are so many ways of sharing reactions to this novel. I have just tried to give a few here. You will find unforgettable characters here, as in all Dickens’s novels. You will laugh at Crabb’s boy’s antics and Uncle Pumblechook’s absurd pomposity. You will loathe the brutish bully, Bentley Drummle and the sly lazy Orlick. You will be in fear and awe of Abel Magwitch, and also, in a different way, of Mr Jaggers, the Old Bailey lawyer. Clever and sharp, “putting a case” but never admitting anything, he remains clinically dispassionate to the last, forever and literally, like Pontius Pilate, washing his hands of the dirty business he had to follow.

You may learn to love his clerk, the kind-hearted Wemmick, with his “postbox” of a mouth, his insistence of the value of “portable property”, and keeping a nice distinction between home life and business life; not to mention the “aged P”, nodding away enthusiastically. Both of these provide some much-needed light relief, in their fortified miniature haven, away from the throng and bustle of the avaricious, mercantile, heartless capital, with its filth, grime and squalor. Wemmick says one may get “cheated, robbed, or murdered in London”.

Such affectionate portraits, these. There is Pip’s true friend, the “pale young gentleman” Herbert Pocket, and his hilariously feckless family; loyal to a fault, but hopelessly impractical, and at a loss to organise their lives. Herbert is so good-natured; the scenes where he demonstrates how to behave in polite society are a delight. Immediately saying that he and Pip are harmonious, he asks if he might call him Handel, because of the “charming piece of music, by Handel, called the Harmonious Blacksmith”. Herbert uses the words “dear” and “good” whenever he refers to Pip, and is genial, frank, friendly, and decent, which Pip has rarely seen.

Perhaps you will admire quiet Biddy and her simple wisdom, seeing far and away more than any other character, or sturdy Joe, the salt of the earth, who offered Pip unconditional love and friendship, and taught him life’s true values. Perhaps you too will be besotted with haughty, beautiful Estelle, who unknown to both Pip and herself is equally a puppet, or cry at the hopelessness of Miss Havisham’s situation, driven half-mad by her obsession and surrounded by sycophantic relatives.

Whenever I see people refer to Dickens’s simpering women, I think of the myriad of strong female characters such as she, or Pip’s demonic whirlwind of a sister, who was “always on the rampage”, or the venomously vindictive Madame Defarge from “A Tale of Two Cities”, or the duplicitous lady’s maid Hortense in “Bleak House”, who was based on a real life murderess, or Nancy, the tragic prostitute in “Oliver Twist”. And there are many, many more. Dickens’s novels are packed with strong women, both good and bad. It is merely that Dickens conformed to the Victorian ideal of female goodness for his heroines. They were to be virtuous, competent, intelligent and compliant, and these are not seen as quite such admirable qualities in the present century.

No, Great Expectations is peopled with characters I am always sad to leave, as I turn the final page. Each time I read it I feel despair, horror and joy in equal measure, and surprised in such a novel to find I burst out laughing at some ridiculous aside or eccentric cameo I had forgotten. Each time I am completely taken up in the twists and turns; one plot twist close to the end will take your breath away when you first learn it. It feels so right, yet Dickens manages to conceal it all the way through. This is a novel where the intrigue is laced throughout. I defy you to guess the ending, should it not be already familiar to you.

Do you want a happy ending for young Pip? He does have one, of sorts. But Dickens was still not satisfied that it was acceptable, after his friend, the novelist Edward Bulwer-Lytton had said it was too sad, so he wrote an alternative couple of paragraphs at the end, slightly changing its course, and leaving it deliberately vague. The original ending was not revealed until after his death, when his mentor and biographer John Forster wrote of it. Many critics do prefer the original darker ending, as being more in keeping with the dark nature of the story. Perhaps you may prefer the Victorian rewrite however, and to imagine a more upbeat and better future for our young hero. Most editions print the original ending afterwards, so the choice is yours.

But please, if you have never read this novel, make sure you leave a place for it in your reading life. I am sure you won’t regret it.

“We are not free to follow our own devices, you and I.”

“Wot larks Pip ol’ chap, wot larks!”

This is such a widely read and classic book that I won’t be writing too much on it, as so much has already been said.

Probably my favorite thing about Dickens’ writing his is use of plot builders (I just recently learned this term), which are subplots that don’t seem relevant to the main plot at the time of their introduction. Then, chapters and chapters later, things connect in a seemingly impossible way that Dickens still manages to make feel entirely plausible. This, plus detailed settings, social commentary, well developed characters, and meaningful character growth, makes for an excellent read. Well worth the reread!

n  LITERARY EXPECTATIONSn

It is said that Satisfaction is equal to Reality minus Expectations.

I reckon then that my rating should be around Eight Stars since Reality would be Five Stars and as my Expectations were on the negative axis—with an absolute value of about three--, it has resulted in a positive eight. The Great Eight, I should anoint this book, then.

How and when were my expectations formed? If I depart on search of my forgotten memories, I think it all started with those black & white films, possibly filmed in the 1940s, watched on TV a couple of decades later and depicting bleak houses, miserable families, desolate cemeteries, poor and unhappy children. A child horrified by cruel settings.

Then it followed a couple of encounters with the somewhat compulsory activity of reading still incomprehensible text with abstruse terms, obscure and alien meaning and unpronounceable titles. The Pickwick Papers… phew…!!!

That was Dickens for me. Clearly on the negative values.

Expectations were affected by my relatively recent read of Bleak House. The humour and the excellent construction of the plot were the reality checkers. That could have also been an exception, though.

But yet again, the humour in GE captivated me, both in some of the situations, the characterisation and the language -- with the effective use of repetitions. Yes, I also appreciated Dicken’s campaign against the social injustices, the moral hypocrisies and the quagmires of the legal system of his time. But these I observed more from the box of a historian and not from the sentiments of a citizen. The world has changed too much for engaging that kind of empathy. And the somewhat caricatured characters, drawn in black and white, gained the solidity of statues. If not made of flesh they were imposing.

Full redemption was sealed when I then watched this filmed version , one of the many old versions that may have daunted me years ago…and found it delightful… and funny. My thinking of Dickens now is of a sophisticated facetious writing, and this I could now detect in the filmed version. May be the quality of the camera work, surprisingly sophisticated, as well as the excellent acting, enchanted me. No longer perceived as dreary, the old prejudices have positively been dissolved. Even the filmed version has been exorcised.

Braced with courage, I took the risk to watch a newer filmed version. This is dangerous because often modern renditions of classics which have been filmed many times, is to depart from the book and offer us an excursion into the sensational, with explicit passion and sex, and modern dialogue. Well, this 2012 production was another joy. Excellent acting and filming. But the most interesting feature was their fleshing out the somewhat caricatured characters. Modern psychology has been infused in the reasoning and motivations of the personalities, so that we understand them more. Yes, even the eccentric Miss Havisham or the much more complex Estella come across not as endearing characters thanks to their peculiarity, but as multifaceted individuals. Likelihood at the expense of the humour,-- but everything has a price.

This other version used the original ending, since Dickens changed it after his friend Edward Bulwer-Lytton advised him to do so. This was another perk of watching this excellent version.


We expect expectations to be better than reality…. It is nice when reality is the other way around.

It's been two months since I've read this book and I still haven't managed to write a review. I think that's because I feel a bit intimidated. This book was just so good, I know I won't be able to write a review to do it justice.

I immediately fell in love with Pip (it literally took one sentence), and as the story went on, I fell in love with the rest of the characters as well. Every single one of them was unique and utterly charming in their own way and definitely memorable. This book could have been several hundred pages longer and I wouldn't have complained, because I felt so involved with everyone's life and just wanted to know more and more.

And the writing style...gosh, it was to die for! I can't put my finger on it, but Dickens has a certain way with words that just fills me with so much joy. It was such a comforting read somehow? I feel like he's the writer I've been waiting to discover for a long time. I can't believe I didn't read more of his books sooner! I wasn't even halfway through the book when I decided I need to read the rest of his works as soon as possible.

I "only" gave it four stars in the end, because I originally thought that there were some unnecessary parts. But the more I think about it, the more I think it deserves a higher rating. I'm sure that when I reread this book (and I know without a doubt I will do so at some point), it will get a full 5 star rating.

2.5

ناامیدی‌های بزرگ!ا

این اولین تجربه من از خوندن کتاب‌های چارلز دیکنز بود و بسیار مغایر بود با اون چیزی بود که انتظار داشتم.

حقیقتش تجربه خوندن این کتاب خیلی شبیه به دیدن کارتون‌های دوران کودکیمون بود. همون داستان‌ها و همون منطق داستانی. همون روایت شیرین حوادث که حتی تلخ‌ترین اتفاقات هم در اون باعث نمیشه اوقات شما لحظه‌ای مکدر بشه. به همراه کاراکترهایی که غیر واقعی هستن اما تلاشی هم برای واقعی جلوه کردن ندارن. انگار خودشون هم می‌دونن که فقط قراره نقش سرگرم کردن مخاطب رو داشته باشن، از همین جهت هم خیلی افراطی هستن. بد طینتی استلا و خانم هاریشام، مهربونی‌های جو گا��جری، رفاقت‌های بی‌کلک هربرت، پست‌فطرتی‌های آقای پامبلچوک و جدیت آقای جگرز همگی مثال‌هایی از شخصیت‌‌پردازی‌های افراطی کتاب بودن که اگرچه برای همون کارتون‌های دوران کودکی خیلی هم بامزه هستن، اما برای من که حالا اومده بودم ببینم چارلز دیکنز که این همه میگن، چیه؟! خیلی ناامید کننده بود.

داستان هم حقیقتا خیلی آبکی بود و ماجرای یک پسر بچه‌ یتیمی هست که ناگهان به یک پول و پله‌ای می‌رسه ولی نمی‌دونه از کجا و داستان همینطور کش میاد تا اینکه بالاخره می‌فهمه کی براش این پولها رو می‌فرستاده و بعد هم پایان هندی ماجرا. نیاز بیشتری به تشریح نداره بنظرم. چیز بخصوص دیگه‌ای هم نداشت. میگم، این داستان جون میده از روش کارتون بسازن برا بچه‌ها. سرگرم کننده بود ولی واقعا ارزش پونصد صفحه رمان رو نداشت.

It was the best of times. It was the worst...

Wait a minute...

Ahem...

I’m easily persuaded, I guess. When I’m out there in the world just bout there doin’ my world stuff, you know, readin’ books, listening to podcasts, and just living my life, I like to take advice from people, especially when it comes to what books to read. So when a guy I trust on a podcast I enjoy says that Dickens is second to Shakespeare as the greatest author of all time, my ears perk up. My ears perk up, and my head drops down, and I shamefully remind myself I’ve never actually finished a book by Charles Dickens. I’ve started a few. I know a story or two. I’ve heard of this guy before, but I’ve never read one of his books from cover to cover.

Until now, friends! Until. Now.

I did the ol’ read the actual book, read the ebook, listen to the audiobook trifecta on this one. I consumed it every chance I had in whatever format I could. Quick side note on the audiobook- I don’t know who the narrator was but the recording sounded like just a normal guy reading the story and recording it in his living room. You could hear him turn the pages, the sound would get louder and softer at times, and there were little hums and pops throughout the whole thing, but I loved it! It was such a lo-fi recording, but it just added to the experience of reading a classic 19th century book. He nailed all the voices, too.

Anyway...

Great expectations is hard to pin down into one genre. At its core, it’s a Bildungsroman story, but it’s filled with adventure, mystery, romance, joy, sadness, violence, sorrow, gain, loss, and much more. I was gripped from the opening pages of Pip encountering a ghostly convince in the marshes, and the story kept me engaged as it rolled along, introducing me to memorable characters, and wrapping me up into a story I will not soon forget.

I honestly did not have great expectations when I picked up this book, and I was very, very surprised with all the plot twists and big reveals in the third act. Dickens weaves together a beautiful story but also a template for modern-day storytellers to follow. Some parts of the story reminded me of recent novels I’ve read, only this one is 150 years older. The book felt fresh though. It never really felt dated or difficult to follow. It’s honestly very accessible and readable today so don’t be intimidated by it. Pick it up and read it.

I’m sure I’ll explore more of Dickens’ work in the future. I’m glad I took the time to read this one, and you should take the time to read it as well.

A young, amiable boy Philip Pirrip with the unlikely nickname of Pip, lives with his older, by twenty years, brutal, ( no motherly love, that's for sure ) unbalanced married sister, Georgiana, his only relative which is very unfortunate, strangely the only friend he has is Joe, his brother-in -law . She, the sister, beats him regularly for no apparent reason, so the boy understandably likes to roam the neighborhood for relief, thinking about pleasant things, the dreams of escape...anything is better than home. One night while visiting the graves of his parents, a desperate, fugitive convict finds him, and threatens the boy in the dark, disquieting, neglected churchyard cemetery, the quite terrified juvenile fears death , the man , a monster in his eyes... he complies with the demands... Pip provides the criminal with food, stealing from his sister but always with the threat of discovery and vicious punishment, the whipping, he knows will follow . Later this has surprising consequences in the future when Pip becomes older, if not wiser. An unexpected invite from the eccentric, man -hating Miss Havisham the riches person in the area, (who is nuttier than a Fruitcake) changes Pip prospects for the better. How weird is Miss Havisham? This recluse still wears her wedding dress, that is literally falling apart, repairs can only do so much decades after being jilted at the altar, she can never forget the unworthy, treacherous fiance who took advantage of the naive woman, for financial gain and move on...sad . Mysterious money given to the lad arrives, from who knows where but Pip is happy and doesn't ask too many questions , would you in his bad situation? So he goes to London to become a gentleman, the poor boy now can have a real life, is happy for the first time and even better has a chance, maybe, a hope, to be honest a miracle would have to occur to win the affection of Estella, the beautiful, intelligent, however somewhat arrogant girl... Miss Havisham foster daughter. Unusual ending keeps this always interesting, as we the reader follow lonely Pip , in his almost fruitless struggle for success, yet this famous classic has one of the most original characters ever imagined in literature . Miss Havisham...you begin by laughing at this pathetic woman until the melancholy shows and your heart changes little by little, you feel...and realize the anguish , the hurt deep inside her, and sympathy goes out to the unhappy lady, her pain is real. A "person" that cannot be forgotten.