Theme Of Relationships In Great Expectations

Decent Essays
Relationships at Their Best and Worst A friend is someone who will stand by your side in both good times and bad, through thick and thin, or just whenever you may need them. In the novel, Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, the author offers students of the twenty-first century helpful advice about maintaining these authentic relationships. This advice is directed to the reader via a honest and unique story about a young boy named Phillip Pirrup, or Pip, and his experience growing up to become a gentleman with help from his friends. The help and guidance of Pip’s friends not only aid him in achieving his “great expectations” but they also support him as he grows into a man of many noble qualities. By portraying examples of both good and …show more content…
For example, Estella is a character in which her adoptive mother uses her as a puppet to get revenge on all men and to break their hearts as one had done to her. By doing so, Pip is trapped as a hopeless romantic, strongly adoring Estella as she is infeasible to him. His want for her love and her unwillingness to provide it is what makes their relationship an unhealthy one. The addiction of Miss Havisham 's manipulation to Estella is yet another negative example of an authentic relationship when Ms. Havisham clearly states, “Well? You can break his heart.” (54) to Estella when Pip first meets her, she clearly portrays the act of using people for her own good/advantage which is a very poor factor in a good relationship. Also, after Estella disses Pip for being a common boy, Pip states, “I was so humiliated, hurt, spurned, offended, angry, sorry (...) that tears started to my eyes. The moment they sprang there, the girl looked at me with a quick delinquent inn having been the cause of them.” (57). Here Estella is proven to be entertained by Pip’s frustration and is proud to be the cause of it. The way Estella treats Pip is unacceptable for the amount of loyalty and admiration that Pip has towards her. This relationship is known to Dickens’ readers as an unhealthy and poor relationship and teaches what a relation should never come

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