The Great Expectations By Charles Dickens

‘Miss Havisham’ is a bitter and twisted character from the novel ‘Great Expectations’ by Charles Dickens. Carol Ann Duffy takes this character and explores her tragic life in the poem ‘Havisham’. Duffy uses Dark themes, structure, symbolism and other poetic techniques to express Havisham’s hatred for men after her tragic wedding when she was rejected by her fiancé. Duffy’s use of these poetic techniques create a sinister character and makes Havisham feel real to the reader.

Havisham is a story which was played and expressed by Miss Havisham. The character Miss Havisham is a name of a character from Charles Dickens, Great Expectations. Throughout the poem she expresses her feelings about the man who had left her at the altar and how it affected her. In the poem there are mixed feelings one minute she remembers her future husband in her sexual dream and the next the poem is violent and wants him dead. Duffy exposes many hidden sides of Miss Havisham such as her pain, her fantasies overall adding depth too her character.

Miss Havisham bewildered everyone around her. Being that she never resolved the past and is still in fact stuck in time. Her outfit was yellowed yet still sparkled.The socks”once white,now yellow, had been trodden ragged”.With this in mind Havisham being stuck in the past in not normal. Life is supposed to grow and change, but she ignores change. But despite everything she strangely is is aware of her old age. “So the days have worn away, have they?” After saying this then quickly redirecting the topic, she states, “I don’t want to know” to Pip’s answer to the date. Even her room is described, “heavily overhung with cobwebs.” It is as if she never set a foot in the room. The furniture is also falling to pieces. For

Miss Havisham plays a big part in Pip's life. Dickens portrays her as a women who has been jilted on her wedding day. This event has ruined her life. Miss Havisham has stopped all clocks and sits in her yellowing wedding dress. Miss havisham has stopped all clocks on the moment she has found out that her lover has jilted her. Dickens describes her in a way whick makes me imagine the castle of the white witch in Narnia, with its frozen statues in the courtyard.

Miss Havisham in the novel “Great Expectations” is a mean, prideful, selfish, old woman who has a big change of heart due to the actions of the protagonist, Pip. “Miss Havisham was a spoiled Child, her mother died when she was a baby, and her father denied her nothing”(page 120). She became comsumed by pride and greed. Later, “there appeared upon the scene a certain man, who made love to miss Havisham”(page 120). The man acted as if he loved Miss

After Pip left Miss Havisham's house, Miss Havisham's wedding gown had caught on fire. Pip ran back inside and saved her but later in the novel, she died due to the burns all over her body. She had really bad burns on her upper body. In my opinion, I think it was an attempt to commit suicide because she felt bad that she did something like that. She was saying "What have I done! What have I done! What have I done!"

This illustrates Miss Havisham’s manipulation of Pip by demanding that he love Estella regardless of any pain she may cause him. This highlights how Miss Havisham seeks to make Pip a suitable partner for Estella, emphasizing the importance of his affection for her. After exchanging words with Miss Havisham, Pip begins to wonder what her intentions were all along, additionally, he questions his own goals. He admits that he “should have said this sooner,” but for his “long mistake,” he hopes that Miss Havisham “meant [them] for one another” (362). This showcases Pip’s internal conflict and the realization of his past mistakes.

She targets Pip and uses Estella to taunt him, saying things to Pip such as, “Love her, love her, love her! If she favors you, love her. If she wounds you, love her. If she tears your heart to pieces-and as it gets older and stronger, it will tear deeper- love her, love her, love her!” (Dickens 253) Through Estella, Miss Havisham makes Pip feel ashamed for things he can’t change.

In Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, Miss Havisham’s death symbolizes Pip’s release from the past and a new ability to move forward in life and prosper. Miss Havisham’s whole life is frozen in time as represented by her dining room, which is covered in “dust and mold,” “cobwebs,” and “fungus” (65) because she has not cleaned or changed since the moment she was left at the altar. Everything is the same, just aged because she could not muster up the courage to clean and face the reality of the situation. When Miss Havisham dies, she releases Pip of his ties to her and to her reluctance to move forward and face reality, thereby allowing Pip to grow and prosper in his future steps in life. Miss Havisham’s death is a symbol of the necessary evil that comes with losing someone close; you now have to take steps forward and face the new

She allowed his actions to shape her view on beauty. The issue of personal appearance has been used repeatedly as an instrument of power and control within the women's movement. Women can be objectivifyed by their beauty, and Miss Havisham is guilty of this, to an extent. Instead of seeing beauty as something to be treasured and appreciated, she objectifys it as a weapon to be wielded at will and feels that in using it to ruin Pip's life, she will feel satisfied and will be able to move on. Her duality comes into play in the difference from which she views herself as opposed to how she views Estella.

While this outward appearance seems to be true, in reality it is all a fraud; having sacrificed her life to memorialize her dead hopes, Ms. Havisham has frozen herself in time, wallowing away in her misery, and still wears her wedding dress with the clocks stopped at "twenty minutes to nine" (R), almost like a dark Snow White who is never to be awakened. The decaying feast and yellowing dresses represent what should have been in Havisham's life; in their preservation, they represent loss. In truth, Havisham is no fairy godmother;instead, she is a "witch" (r). Skeletal and like waxwork, she is the monstrous side of the female figure, and has raised Estella as a weapon to take revenge on men, as she has never let go the injustice of what her fiancée had done to her. Pip realizes Ms. Havisham's intent early on, hearing Ms. Havisham tell Estella to “break his heart” (r) while playing the game Beggar My Neighbor, but is smitten by Estella, and clings to the hope that Estella is meant to be with him. With the promise of adulthood and riches, Pip is entranced, imputing characteristics such as beauty and goodness onto Ms. Havisham, but looks past what Havisham really is: darkness, evil, a witch, and a

Miss Havisham shows no emotion whenever Pip visits. She tells him that a man broke her heart and that all men are terrible. Pip later receives a note from her that says to go see her immediately. When Pip gets there, Miss Havisham makes him an offer. She wants to have a conversation about the idea Pip had the last time he visited.

Miss Havisham is an odd ball of an character in Charles Dickens Novel, Great Expectations. But she a bit too odd, which means there has to be something mentally wrong. Miss Havisham was left at her own wedding, and was heartbroken so much, that she locked herself away, never taking off her veil. Eventually she adopts Estella into who her life, who originally was Magwitch’s child. Then later is introduced to Pip, and uses Estella to break Pip's heart in vengeance of her own being broken.

and I, but to obey our instructions. We are not free to follow our own

man who will kill him (kill Pip), if Pip did not bring food and a file