Discovering Dickens - A Community Reading Project
 

Discovering Dickens

Biographical Context

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Great Expectations

Archived Novels

 

 

<i>Great Expectations</i>


Notes on the Novel
• Maps and Illustrations
• Key to Allusions
• Glossary of Historical Things and Conditions

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Previously, in Great Expectations...

Last time, Pip, planning to leave the country with Magwitch, went to take leave of Miss Havisham. He asked her to continue the service he had begun to do for Herbert, being no longer able to complete it himself (he had determined to accept no more of Magwitch's money); and he expressed his despair at the discovery that she had never intended him for Estella. The case, unfortunately, was worse than he thought -- Estella was engaged to Drummle. So upset that he walked all the way back to London, Pip turned into the Temple late at night, and found a note from Wemmick waiting for him at the gate -- "Don't go home."

Pip lodged in a hotel for the night, and went to Walworth in the morning. Wemmick explained that Magwitch had been missed in Australia, that Pip's rooms were being watched, and that the convict had been secretly removed up the river to the lodgings of Herbert's fianc¹e. Pip, visiting Herbert and Clara, verified that Magwitch was safe, and Pip and Herbert agreed that Pip should take up boating on the Thames. A habit of rowing would avert suspicion when Pip and Magwitch had to make their escape -- via the river -- onto an out-bound steamer.

 

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