I felt the need to do another Dickens, which is how it should be considering it is Dickens’ 200th Birthday year.
Great Expectations is more of a plot driven novel compared to some of his other work, and not as long as David Copperfield or Bleak House.
I did the audio book (narrated by Simon Vance) and although I enjoyed it very much I found that I kept drawing comparisons to David Copperfield and I found that I didn’t like Pip half as much as David. Pip is a blacksmith’s boy who is told he is to come into Great Expectations. He immediately believes it to be from the dotty but wealthy Miss Haversham whom he visits.
As soon as Pip receives his good news he basically doesn’t take a second glance back at his home, his village or his friends. I did not like that in his character at all, expecially when it means forgetting the lovely Joe Gargery his brother-in-law and father figure. When Pip finally receives the news of his benefactor, it comes as a bit of a shock, and worse still it looks like he’s not going to come into his money after all, it is then that he finds out who his real friends are.
It’s a moral tale, and for a quick Dickens read it’s a good one. But, for my money give me David Copperfield every time.
Maxine
I agree with you. Copperfield is the most recent Dickens I have read, and I was a bit reluctant to start it because I was tired of tragic heroes and relentless misery in books like Twist and Expectations. but Copperfield is an absolute masterpiece and should be required reading for everybody.
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