The Great
Expectations
CHAPTERS 1-6/ CHARACTERS/ CONTEXT
, A03: Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens was a British novelist who lived from 1812 to 1870. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest writers of the Victorian era, and his novels are celebrated for their vi
characters, social commentary, and intricate plots. Dickens had a difficult childhood, marked by poverty and family struggles. He was forced to leave school at a young age and work
factory to support his family. However, he was a voracious reader and eventually became a journalist, publishing articles and sketches in various magazines. Poverty is the main them
Novels. E.g. “Oliver Twist” & “David Copperfield”.
In spite of humble beginnings, little education, and the sometimes-critical literary reviewers, Charles Dickens was loved by his public, and amassed wealth, prestige, and a large legac
published works. He was one of the few writers to enjoy both popular acceptance and financial success while still alive. The drive for this success had its roots in his childhood- an exa
moving through the social class.
Charles John Huffam Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England on Friday, February 7, 1812. He was the second of eight children born to John and Elizabeth Dickens. His father, John, w
son of illiterate servants. John Dickens managed to escape a similar fate when the family his parents worked for got him a job in a navy pay office. John continued his upward climb by
keeping his own lowly background a secret and courting Elizabeth Barrow, the daughter of a wealthy senior clerk who worked there. The marriage succeeded, but John's hopes for fur
advancement fizzled when his father-in-law was accused of embezzlement and fled the country. Eventually, he ended up inn prison and it was then Dickens started attending school a
He eventually became a law clerk, then a court reporter, and finally a novelist. His first novel, The Pickwick Papers, became a huge popular success when Dickens was only twenty-fiv
published extensively and was considered a literary celebrity until his death in 1870.
Many of the events from Dickens’s early life are mirrored in Great Expectations, which, apart from David Copperfield, is his most autobiographical novel. Pip, the novel’s protagonist,
the marsh country, works at a job he hates, considers himself too good for his surroundings, and experiences material success in London at a very early age, exactly as Dickens hims
In addition, one of the novel’s most appealing characters, Wemmick, is a law clerk, and the law, justice, and the courts are all important components of the story.
The loss of this financial opportunity did not slow the spending habits of John and Elizabeth, who liked the upper-class lifestyle (Mr & Mrs Joe). This problem would be their downfall as
went on. However his father's financial problems required a move to smaller quarters in London when Dickens was ten. Their four-room home was cramped, creditors called frequentl
to collect payments, and Dickens' parents alternated between the stress of survival and the gaiety of continuing to party. Dickens wanted to return to school but was instead sent to w
the age of twelve to help support the family. It was a firsthand experience of poverty and prison life and a reinforcement of the considerable insecurity and emotional abandonment th
marked his childhood. These conditions defined Dickens’s time, and they make themselves felt in almost every facet of Great Expectations. Pip’s sudden rise from country laborer to c
gentleman forces him to move from one social extreme to another while dealing with the strict rules and expectations that governed Victorian England. Ironically, this novel about the
for wealth and social advancement was written partially out of economic necessity
, A03: Critical Essays Children and 19th-Century
England
For thousands of years, families put their children to work on their farms or in whatever labour was necessary for survival — only children of the wealthy and powerful
escaped this fate. Until the last one hundred years or so, children were considered by most societies to be the property of their parents. They had little protection from
governments who viewed children as having no human or civil rights outside of their parents' wishes, and Great Expectations brings some of these conditions to light.
The industrial revolution in early nineteenth-century England (the industrial revolution started about one hundred years later in the United States) made things worse.
Laborers were in greater demand than ever. Mines, factories, and shops needed help, and not enough men or women could fill their needs. Children were cheap, plent
and easy to control. Orphanages — and even parents — would give their children to the owners of cotton mills and other operations in exchange for the cost of mainta
them.
At that time, the government didn't establish a minimum age, wage, or working hours. Children as young as five or six were forced to work thirteen to sixteen hours a
slave wages and barely any food. The Sadler Committee, investigating textile factory conditions for Parliament in 1832, discovered children working from six in the mo
to nine at night with no breakfast, one hour for lunch, and a two-mile walk home. Children late for work were often beaten, and if they worked too slowly or fell asleep
machines, they were hit with a strap, sometimes severely. There was no family time and some of them did not get supper because they were too tired to wait for it. Ch
who were "bound" to companies often tried to run away. If they were caught, they were whipped. Aside from being underfed, exhausted, sick, or injured, children spen
many hours a day over factory machines often had bowed legs and poorly developed limbs and muscles.
The coal mines were worse, with young children having to travel through the mines without any light, often carrying loads while walking in water that was up to their c
The main reason for employing women and children in the mines was that they would work for less than a man would accept.
If a child was not "lucky" enough to be employed in these manners, they had the unpleasant option of life on the streets, with its raw sewage, rotting animal and vege
wastes in the streets, rats, disease, and bad water. They also had to find food and a place to stay out of the rain and cold. Turning to crime for survival was not an act
greed so much as one of pure need. Small wonder, then, that Magwitch turned to crime at a young age.
As the century progressed, laws were passed that outlawed infant abandonment and failure to provide shelter, clothing, food, and medical care. In 1884, national laws
Britain protected children in their own homes. In addition, Parliament regulated working conditions, minimum age for working, and the length of the workday for childr
Laws for mandatory schooling, however, did not come until the twentieth century.
Expectations
CHAPTERS 1-6/ CHARACTERS/ CONTEXT
, A03: Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens was a British novelist who lived from 1812 to 1870. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest writers of the Victorian era, and his novels are celebrated for their vi
characters, social commentary, and intricate plots. Dickens had a difficult childhood, marked by poverty and family struggles. He was forced to leave school at a young age and work
factory to support his family. However, he was a voracious reader and eventually became a journalist, publishing articles and sketches in various magazines. Poverty is the main them
Novels. E.g. “Oliver Twist” & “David Copperfield”.
In spite of humble beginnings, little education, and the sometimes-critical literary reviewers, Charles Dickens was loved by his public, and amassed wealth, prestige, and a large legac
published works. He was one of the few writers to enjoy both popular acceptance and financial success while still alive. The drive for this success had its roots in his childhood- an exa
moving through the social class.
Charles John Huffam Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England on Friday, February 7, 1812. He was the second of eight children born to John and Elizabeth Dickens. His father, John, w
son of illiterate servants. John Dickens managed to escape a similar fate when the family his parents worked for got him a job in a navy pay office. John continued his upward climb by
keeping his own lowly background a secret and courting Elizabeth Barrow, the daughter of a wealthy senior clerk who worked there. The marriage succeeded, but John's hopes for fur
advancement fizzled when his father-in-law was accused of embezzlement and fled the country. Eventually, he ended up inn prison and it was then Dickens started attending school a
He eventually became a law clerk, then a court reporter, and finally a novelist. His first novel, The Pickwick Papers, became a huge popular success when Dickens was only twenty-fiv
published extensively and was considered a literary celebrity until his death in 1870.
Many of the events from Dickens’s early life are mirrored in Great Expectations, which, apart from David Copperfield, is his most autobiographical novel. Pip, the novel’s protagonist,
the marsh country, works at a job he hates, considers himself too good for his surroundings, and experiences material success in London at a very early age, exactly as Dickens hims
In addition, one of the novel’s most appealing characters, Wemmick, is a law clerk, and the law, justice, and the courts are all important components of the story.
The loss of this financial opportunity did not slow the spending habits of John and Elizabeth, who liked the upper-class lifestyle (Mr & Mrs Joe). This problem would be their downfall as
went on. However his father's financial problems required a move to smaller quarters in London when Dickens was ten. Their four-room home was cramped, creditors called frequentl
to collect payments, and Dickens' parents alternated between the stress of survival and the gaiety of continuing to party. Dickens wanted to return to school but was instead sent to w
the age of twelve to help support the family. It was a firsthand experience of poverty and prison life and a reinforcement of the considerable insecurity and emotional abandonment th
marked his childhood. These conditions defined Dickens’s time, and they make themselves felt in almost every facet of Great Expectations. Pip’s sudden rise from country laborer to c
gentleman forces him to move from one social extreme to another while dealing with the strict rules and expectations that governed Victorian England. Ironically, this novel about the
for wealth and social advancement was written partially out of economic necessity
, A03: Critical Essays Children and 19th-Century
England
For thousands of years, families put their children to work on their farms or in whatever labour was necessary for survival — only children of the wealthy and powerful
escaped this fate. Until the last one hundred years or so, children were considered by most societies to be the property of their parents. They had little protection from
governments who viewed children as having no human or civil rights outside of their parents' wishes, and Great Expectations brings some of these conditions to light.
The industrial revolution in early nineteenth-century England (the industrial revolution started about one hundred years later in the United States) made things worse.
Laborers were in greater demand than ever. Mines, factories, and shops needed help, and not enough men or women could fill their needs. Children were cheap, plent
and easy to control. Orphanages — and even parents — would give their children to the owners of cotton mills and other operations in exchange for the cost of mainta
them.
At that time, the government didn't establish a minimum age, wage, or working hours. Children as young as five or six were forced to work thirteen to sixteen hours a
slave wages and barely any food. The Sadler Committee, investigating textile factory conditions for Parliament in 1832, discovered children working from six in the mo
to nine at night with no breakfast, one hour for lunch, and a two-mile walk home. Children late for work were often beaten, and if they worked too slowly or fell asleep
machines, they were hit with a strap, sometimes severely. There was no family time and some of them did not get supper because they were too tired to wait for it. Ch
who were "bound" to companies often tried to run away. If they were caught, they were whipped. Aside from being underfed, exhausted, sick, or injured, children spen
many hours a day over factory machines often had bowed legs and poorly developed limbs and muscles.
The coal mines were worse, with young children having to travel through the mines without any light, often carrying loads while walking in water that was up to their c
The main reason for employing women and children in the mines was that they would work for less than a man would accept.
If a child was not "lucky" enough to be employed in these manners, they had the unpleasant option of life on the streets, with its raw sewage, rotting animal and vege
wastes in the streets, rats, disease, and bad water. They also had to find food and a place to stay out of the rain and cold. Turning to crime for survival was not an act
greed so much as one of pure need. Small wonder, then, that Magwitch turned to crime at a young age.
As the century progressed, laws were passed that outlawed infant abandonment and failure to provide shelter, clothing, food, and medical care. In 1884, national laws
Britain protected children in their own homes. In addition, Parliament regulated working conditions, minimum age for working, and the length of the workday for childr
Laws for mandatory schooling, however, did not come until the twentieth century.
