Great Expectations Discussion of Characters

Love is wanted from every person in the world shown in all different forms. In the novel Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, all of the characters illustrate a love of one thing or another. Some people have the love of impacting others with miserable emotions and others have the love of caring for another; one common theme that continues occurring in life is love.

The name Estella comes from the word star, always shining and beautiful. However, Estella has a dark inside with a heart so dim that she is unable to feel true love with a person. As she grew up, she was told by her adopted mother, Miss Havisham, to hurt people deeply, so from her own knowledge, Estella began to turn it around on her. “[I]f you had taught her, from the dawn of her intelligence, with your utmost energy and might, that there was such a thing as daylight, but that it was made to be her enemy and destroyer, and she must always turn against it, for it had blighted you and would else blight her… I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.” (p. 307) Daylight was used in this quotation as an analogy to love. Estella knew what type of a person she had become: evil. She knew Miss Havisham had raised her to be hurtful to others and began to blame her for creating her into a monster. Although Estella recognized her bad behavior, the habit could not stop.

On the opposite end of the love spectrum from Estella, you will see Joe who portrays filial love. All of Pip’s family had died except for his sister who had married Joe, but she, like Estella, treated him cruelly leaving only Joe to care about the poor fellow. “But I loved Joe—perhaps for no better reason in those early days than because the dear fellow let me love him…” (p. 40) This brotherly love between the two helped Pip through tough times as a young boy. Pip moved up in society leaving Joe behind him, but Joe remained strong and still helped Pip out when assistance became necessary. He never expected people to go beyond what they had capability of and accepted them as they were.

Great Expectations exposed a large variety of characters, and each character had a distinct love of something. Not all love is great and not all love is bad; many people love sweets but feel guilty as they enjoy it feeling as though sweets are awful things to love, yet marriage can demonstrate a beautiful love. Estella has learned to love destroying others and Joe loves to care for others; though their loves differ from each other, love is important to them and to all people in the human race.