Great Expectations

Pip is the narrator of the story, which begins when he is aged seven. He is an orphan living with his sister and her husband who is the local blacksmith. Their home is set in the marshes of Kent.

One evening while visiting his parents' graves, an escaped convict, who orders him at the peril of his life to obtain food and a file for his leg irons, grabs Pip. Pip obeys and the convict is soon captured, but he protects Pip by claiming to have stolen the items himself.

Miss Havisham, who lives in a grand house outside Pip's village, is a wealthy woman, who was jilted on her wedding day and her home has not changed since that date. The dining room table is still prepared for the wedding feast. Pip is asked to visit the house and play with Miss Havisham's adopted daughter, Estella. Estella is a very beautiful young girl and she captivates Pip. She treats him coldly and harshly, and Pip dreams of becoming worthy enough of her, and he is determined to obtain some sort of education.

Some years later Pip is sponsored by Miss Havisham to become apprentice to his brother-in-law, Joe. Pip feels this is a type of imprisonment and he can see no way of obtaining his dreams.

One day a lawyer named Jaggers, who also represents Miss Havisham, meets Pip and Joe to advise them that Pip has a secret benefactor, and that he is now a man of great expectations. Pip naturally assumes that the benefactor is Miss Havisham, and that he is being groomed to marry Estella.

He is sent to London to become a young gentleman, and he resides with Herbert Pocket with whom he becomes a great friend. Now that he is to be a gentleman, he turns his back on Joe and his roots.

After several years, Estella still treats Pip harshly, even though he is now a man of means and he wonders if he will ever win her hand.

One stormy night, a convict called Magwitch barges into Pip's room, announcing that he is Pip's benefactor. It is the same convict that Pip helped as a boy. The convict has dedicated his life to making Pip a gentleman, using the fortune he has accumulated in Australia. Magwitch is 'a lifer', and if he is caught in England, he will be executed.

Pip and his friend Herbert arrange for Magwitch to escape to the continent, the plan being that Pip will accompany him.

Magwitch's former partner in crime was a man called Compeyson, who had been a gentleman