Great Expectations Essay

â€Å"Even though Pip has become snobbish by the end of Book One, Dickens still manages to make the reader like him†. Show how and why Pip has become something of a snob and what makes us retain our sympathy for him – Tom Beach In Great Expectations Dickens depicts Pip as having an increasingly snobbish character throughout Book One. He shows Pip to have an exaggerated respect for his social position and his growing hatred for the common life that he lives. The reader sees that Pip’s snobbishness is due to his desire to become a gentleman and his aspiration to be liked by Estella, from whom he adopts some of his snobbish attitudes. Even though it is clear to the reader that Pip has become somewhat of a snob, Dickens encourages the reader to still like Pip. He puts across that Pip is an orphan and that these snobbish feelings we see are just outward feelings. We learn that he was not proud of the snobbish character that he had become from the way he looks back on his life as an adult. These events make the reader feel sympathy for Pip, leading the reader to retain their criticism of him. In Book One of Great Expectations we see Dickens show Pip’s progressively snobbish character in many ways. After Pip’s first visit to Satis house and after falling for Estella we see Pips ambition to become a gentleman. We see that Pip blames Joe for being common, and for Joe not bringing him up as Pip thinks he should: â€Å"I wish Joe had been rather more genteelly brought up, and then I should have been so too. † We see Pip’s snobbish character developing as he blames Joe for being common; he is ‘ashamed of the dear good fellow’ and disappointed in him for being so ‘ignorant and common’. Pip is patronising towards Joe for something Joe has no control over. Pip feels he is able to comment on Joe’s social status because he does not belong to ‘[his]’ higher society and would be an embarrassment in front of Estella. This sudden change of attitude in Pip that wants to dismiss his family comes as a great shock to the reader. We see this to be a case of him being a snob. In Book One, one of the main points of Pips character that shows Pip to be something of a snob is his patronising attitude towards Mrs Joe. When Pip is going to see Miss Havisham with Joe and accompanied with Mrs Joe Pip feels embarrassed because they are trying to dress up to much: â€Å"I am not quite clear whether these articles were carried penitentially or ostentatiously. † Pip feels that his sister, Mrs Joe is very much overdressed, trying to look more ladylike that she really is. He is very patronising to her, as seen in the above quotation for simply being overdressed. Pip feels he is above her. Pip shows his growing snobbishness due to the fact that he is so willingly able to dismiss who he is and what he should become: I had believed in the forge as the glowing road to manhood and independence. Within a single year, all this was changed. Now, it was all coarse and common. We see Pip has lost faith in his normal life in the forge, dismissing the fact that that a life in the forge is what he is meant for. Pip will never like Joes’ trade and is sad when he is made apprentice to him: â€Å"And what could I possibly do then, but say I was enjoying myself – when I wasn’t. † Pip feels that the apprenticeship will tie him away from his ambition. He feels the forge is so ‘coarse and common’ that it will prevent him from becoming a gentleman. Pip feels that he is too good for the community that he lives in; he wants to get away from it: â€Å"It would be very disagreeable to be stared at by all the people here. † We see Pip deciding not to go into town in his new suit. He again feels that he is above all the people in the village, that ‘they would make such a business of it – such a coarse and common business’ that ‘[he] couldn’t bear [himself]’. This fact that he looks down on everybody in the village depicts him as a vain snob; he is not going to be a ‘rustic’ man anymore. In the closing stages of Book One we see Pip being very snobbish and capricious towards Biddy, a girl who looks after the house and has fallen in love with Pip: ‘Biddy’ I returned with some resentment, ‘you are so exceedingly quick that it’s difficult to keep up with you. ‘