Great Expectations

Great Expectations

Charles Dickens


The first few lines of Great Expectations establish with immediacy the sad plot of the orphan Pip. He has never known his parents and is completely alone in a desolate cemetery trying to imagine what they looked like. As Pip is only seven years old, it can be assumed he has little history with which to begin his tale; therefore, the reader is thrown at once into his life by means of the narrative action.
Structurally, the novel establishes itself as a first-person retrospective, which means the narrator is remembering the events of his life and has arranged them to suit his fashion in telling the tale. The immediate sympathy gained by the situation (an orphan alone in a cemetery) and the fact his only sister, Mrs Joe Gargery, finds him a nuisance and a burden, reinforce the credibility of the narrator (the older orphan looking back on his life). The audience is compelled to like the narrator, to trust him and want the best for him.
...