Great Expectations

The Classics bug has taken hold of me and I decided to continue the streak with Dickens. My choice was Great Expectations, based on the feedback from this Reddit thread on Charles Dickens’ ‘best work’.

There’s a special kind of joy in reading Dickens. While he’s never in the league of the great Russian masters, his engagement with the underclass of Victorian Britain and his portrayal of the social dynamics of the age are unparalleled.

Dickens’ childhood wasn’t easy. His father was imprisoned for failing to pay his debts and Dickens was forced to work in a Blacking Factory pasting labels on shoe polish. The humiliation and shame of these days must have definitely influenced him while writing about Pip’s own childhood, growing up with a blacksmith. These experiences also shaped David Copperfield, his most autobiographical novel. But more on that later…

David Lane’s 1946 adaptation (streaming on YouTube) is considered to be the greatest but my vote would go for the 1998 version starring Ethan Hawke and Gyneth Paltrow. This version, set in modern-day America was refreshing. The overt sexual dynamic between Pip and Estelle was also memorable in the movie and caught me off guard.

And some memorable lines on the ‘Memorable Days’ of life:

That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day

I chanced upon two impressive art works on the book. The first was by Edward Carey published in the NYT:

And the second was this piece featuring Pip, Estella and Miss Havisham created for the six-part Hulu adaptation:

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