Great Expectations, by
Charles Dickens, is part of the
Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student
and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of
Barnes & Noble Classics:
New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and
endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to
challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriateAll editions are beautifully designed and are printed to
superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. Barnes & Noble Classics pulls together a constellation of influences—biographical, historical, and
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Great Expectations, described by G. K. Chesterton as a “study in human weakness and the slow human surrender,” may be called
Charles Dickens’s finest moment in a remarkably
illustrious literary career.
In an overgrown churchyard, a grizzled convict springs upon an orphan named Pip. The convict terrifies the young boy and threatens to kill him unless Pip helps further his escape. Later, Pip
finds himself in the ruined garden where he meets the bitter and crazy Miss Havisham and her foster child Estella, with whom he immediately falls in love. After a secret benefactor gives him a
fortune, Pip moves to London, where he cultivates great expectations for a life which would allow him to discard his impoverished beginnings and socialize with the idle upper class. As Pip
struggles to become a gentleman and is tormented endlessly by the beautiful Estella, he slowly learns the truth about himself and his illusions.
Written in the last decade of his life,
Great Expectations reveals Dickens’s dark attitudes toward Victorian society, its inherent class structure, and its materialism. Yet this novel
persists as one of Dickens’s most popular. Richly comic and immensely readable,
Great Expectations overspills with vividly drawn characters, moral maelstroms, and the sorrow and pity of
love.
Radhika Jones is a doctoral candidate in English and comparative literature at Columbia University and the managing editor of
Grand Street magazine.