Great Expectations (A Norton Critical Edition)

The editor provides many important notes, some of which are intentionally humorous. Questions which readers might raise are often anticipated and answered. The essays are scholarly (as one would expect in a "critical edition"), but in most cases they approach the text in ways that respect the needs of "common" readers and "uncommon" ones, too. Buy this text! You'll add to your appreciation of the novel and Dickens.

This review is inspired by a specific volume provided with an afterword by a noted academic. The novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald concluded enduring novels go through a sequence of readerships: First the ordinary man on the street, then the student and finally the scholar. Beware the words of this scholar when reading Charles Dickens work of genius, “Great Expectations.” Beware the student and the academic. Why?Do not bring an admired art into the abomination of a classroom – especially in the case of a revered novel. The cold, hard outlines of the physical structure will accomplish nothing more than smothering refined, personal admiration where yawning students and formulated academics take on the role of poor actors repeating opinions garnered from other academics often wide of the author’s intentions as experienced by the novice. And here their substitutes are intended to elevate themselves propped up by illusions any other persons with originality would not discover based on personal experience.According to the Bayesian Probability Construct humans learn by the accumulation of “priors” (previous experiences) stored subconsciously within the brain to be called upon in the calculation of the probabilities of outcomes in situation calling for resolution. What such priors are, and the procedures by which probabilities are calculated evade the purview in ordinary academic situations simply because teachers are unaware of them. These logical procedures have been genetically implanted by eons of evolution and are not amenable to alteration. Conscious experience is manufactured from the priors and the “instinctive” functions of the human brain in a series of “now moments” each lasting two to three seconds and are anything but orderly and predictable, giving rise to new conceptions and thus, “creativity.” Such experiences result from global changes in brain areas rather than synaptic alterations within single neurons.Material alterations of the learning environment are called for here. Classes should become nonlinear and the direction of the study based on the free, casual conversations among students and teachers. Students would be asked to make probabilistic responses to situations in keeping with the prior experiences rather than linear lectures and related forms of pedagogy. Also, more emphasis should be placed in on experiences outside of school, including hobbies and prior experiences based on accidental occurrences since the Universe achieves creativity by chance rather than completion of preordained destinies. More reliance would be made on real world experimental activities as a basis of judgments about probabilistic reasoning. The influence of fields considered tangential to a subject should be brought in including the origins of philosophy, mathematics, and historical development of worldviews. The quaint suggestion made here is “creative learning” is a pleasure. “There is no greater pleasure than to think a thought no one has thought before.”Typically, students are required to memorize what they are told by the scholar and not think independently under any circumstances. Notable examples of writers who have escaped this confinement include Dick, Howard, King, Burroughs, Bradbury, the Bronte Sisters, Poe and Mary Shelley within a host of others. In effect, a novel should become a magical creation modified and exalted over time as a fairy tale is on repeated recitations.So, ignore AFTERWORD provided in any “classic edition.” In such a one we are told that Dickens had entered uncertain times – losing of a wife and once esteemed friends, considering adopting a mistress, supporting a floundering, self published periodical, losing his sense of humor and the creatures which scrambled before him on walkways to be scattered with a stick had become particularly bothersome (the last of these added as an independent thought in the interests of completeness.). Based on these considerations according to the author of the AFTERWORD, Dickens wrote his “classic novel”.On the contrary, an ordinary man on the street would develop no such contention. Rather, a young fellow, “Pip” - an abbreviated version of his full name, “Phillip Pirrip” begins as a poor soul all (save one) of whose siblings and parents have retired to the graveyard, and he is abandoned with his one remaining and abusive sister and her saintly, blacksmith husband to eke out a meager existence. Some of such details are reminiscent of Dickens’ childhood. The story then develops when he encounters eccentrics of different realms of personal existence. Staring at the printed pages, the reader might begin to wonder which one of these alternative ways of living should “Pip” aim for, and how will this influence his thinking about himself and others when he reaches young adulthood? Should he aim for “Landed Gentleman” or “Ingenious Criminal?” Both of these might be difficult to achieve or yield benefits short of expectation. The AFTERWORD does not mention any of this specifically, probably because the idea is so obvious that one must avoid embarrassment by discussing more subtle matters about Dickens’ mental state when he took up his pen to rescue his floundering and renamed journal, “All the Year Round.”By chance, an innocent reader might stumble upon just the perfect starting point for the analysis of the events and characters in “Great Expectations.” Suppose a fortunate accident (“synchronicity’) should yield Marie-Louise von Franz’s structural analysis of stories in general entitled, “An Interpretation of Fairy Tales” in which she reveals the most elemental structure and origin of such a story as related to myths, archetypal motifs, etc. composing the psyche, as related to the uniquely structured British society of the Middle 19th Century, and the enduring aspects of the world culture from Ancient Greece to the present. One estimate suggests the variations in such Fairy Tales number about a dozen. Significantly, Pip is introduced as learning to read from family tomb inscriptions embodying the most enduring expression of his family members, namely their “skeletons.”Accordingly, Dickens had lost his sense of humor, yet the novice reader might detect a similar comedic tone in the Mathew Pocket home scene filled with children described as “tumbled up” rather than “brought up,” and the scene in “Alice in Wonderland” involving the Duchess and the baby who transforms into a small pig. Comic relief is provided in depictions of plays attended by Pip, ineptly performed, even when the author of such plays is identified as Shakespeare. Depending on the reader’s depth of reading experience in the classics he might notice a similarity (among others) to his own life with the “fellows down the street,” and Pip’s convoluted travels where he meets odd and interesting characters reflective of Cyclops, the Sirens, and Calypso described in the Odyssey of Ulysses.As another parallel, one might also note similarities in Dickens’ and Dostoevsky’s descriptions of rundown, rooming houses of London and St. Petersburg - especially the dark, cold staircases and their dim, cavernous interiors (crouching almost formless denizens embody the elemental nighttime fears of children) of the rooms themselves and the environs where Raskolnikov hatched his plot. A notable feature of Dickens’ narrative is the almost complete detachment of ordinary people from the progress of the plot. Also, the “split personality syndrome” of Raskolnikov seems shared by Dickens’, Magwitch - both criminals are transformed by Christian redemptive experience (repeated from Sunday Schools) into a saint is remarkable. More profitably, might they represent extreme variations in human nature both comforting and hateful?Among the eccentrics who appear in the pages of “Great Expectations” some might suitably be compared with graduates from Bart Simpson’s “Institute of Unreasonable Expectations;” often bent on achieving wealth and position even at the expense of faultless others. Such people might be synonymous with motifs of fairy tales where failure to reach some great expectation is revealed. Significant in advancing the intrigues of the plot are old, haggard Lady Havisham living in her yellowed wedding dress near a rotted wedding cake inhabited by assorted vermin many years after her failed wedding; Estella, her cold, loveless, beautiful, strangely detached housemate destined to relive her fate; or, Molly, a lawyer’s assistant committed murder and was “gotten off” by the very same lawyer; and finally Georgiana Gargery, sister of Pip and burdened with a fruitless marriage to the blacksmith, Joseph Gargery, What is the lost expectation? The same bliss of marital glory is denied them as to Cinderella’s homely stepsisters is a possibility. Incidentally, Pip is madly in love with Estella, but she does not respond even to him, and lives hopelessly in the company of an unfeeling fellow, Drummie. She and Havisham resemble Sleeping Beauty who was never awakened by a kiss from an enchanted Prince Charming, The home and remains of a brewery where Havisham and Estella lived is eventually torn down to its skeletal remains.Another set of characters might be compared with a compulsion for the benefits of wealth, either earned or swindled from the holdings of the more lucky or industrious. Among these characters are those who are devious enough or heartless enough to be identified as “criminals.” Some specific examples of this motif include, Georgiana, Raymond, Camilla, Pumplechook, Orlick, Magwich. In these we might identify a fairy tale motif – expressed in current terms, the “Disappointed Lottery Winner.” Here, a person achieves wealth yielded by a chance occurrence, only to find that friends are transformed into vampires sucking away blood money – or, the wealth does obtain a questionable security, but does not buy the elusive “happiness.” How their visions of themselves and others transformed over time as they achieve or fail to reach life goals ever contemplated or only experienced as a haunting? Perhaps they should have composed an “ability and interest inventory” to guide them in their selection life goals.Rather unique among the characters mentioned here is the lawyer, Jaggers whose formal operation in completing a day’s work is a ritual washing of his hands. Undoubtedly, Dickens was referring to the guilt of Pontius Pilate and his eternal hand washing. Herbert and Wemmick (his assistants) as part of their successful completion of job requirements and satisfaction is to lose their originality and unique personality completely while in Jagger’s presence – a state comparable to the mindless life of a modern office worker.The list of characters in “Great Expectations” is long, and one would have to rewrite the novel to include all of them. As an alternative the following question might be posed: “Do any of these (and any of an assemblage of lesser characters) achieve the benefits of the Simpson’s, “Institute of Unreasonable Expectations?”As a youth Dickens came into contact with individuals like those described above and had experiences including, coming from a family with numerous siblings, the haunt of debt, hunger and lack of warmth and other amenities of personal comfort, threat of debtors prison and child “slave labor” factories, from which he would later escape through profits from his writing. Was he taking advantage of the indigent in this way and just as guilty as individuals who ignored plights altogether since poverty might be deemed as a sign of inferiority? Or, did he use his writing to draw attention to these social ills? In “Great Expectations” Dickens does not reveal many of those in need escaping their plights either out of lack of opportunity or of what might be called poor “forced choices.” In 21st Century society social programs at government expense have attempted to ameliorate suffering. Have they succeeded or merely obscured the causes? Nonetheless, Dickens has been identified as an advocate of social change based on the gentle principles of Christianity. Or, from his financial success did he believe his innate “superiority” had come to the fore?How might certain "unfortunate " experiences contribute to the elusive, "creativity"? Consider the words of modern psychology, mathematics and science. Mathematicians in their manipulation and application of numbers make a significant point on their limits – certain matters are unique and cannot therefore be compared to one another. Following, “minds” are unique and cannot be compared based this premise. Categories and probabilities, found in comparable entities, do not apply to unique minds, even though the “arrogantly ignorant” attempt to do so. A coercive idea here related is the matter of “free will.” Free will does not exist, since the formulation of an act is based on a unique set of interrelated factors and it is not possible to follow them all. Yet, free will is preserved as an “indispensable illusion.” The prediction of which of these unique minds will use the accumulated knowledge of humanity in a creative act, cannot be calculated. Specifically, a noted philosopher and debater was an alcoholic and developed throat cancer. He was asked if he regretted the drinking. He said “No!” because he thought the drink contributed to his success. Consider Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem, “Xanadu;” he composed while in drug induced dream state. Are the innocently ignorant in a position to caution these creators to alter their behaviors? Or, consider the wisdom of computer programs advising changes in the grammar of “The Ancient Mariner”.Of course, the greater number of people will disappear without a trace except for a tomb inscription (if that). But whatever process produces the exceptional individual might best not be tampered with. The greater mass of humanity in an advanced society (on experiencing difficulties) can rely on health care programs for aid. In schools, students will be identified as “special needs” and obtain counseling and medication. Even there, in cases of psychological matters, such help might simply yield “mindless emptiness.” Here, it might be well to remember the fate of Winston in “1984,” when he tried to think creatively in a coercive society demanding, “Give your mind to us and we will take care of the rest.” The above is an attempt to demonstrate such societies are inadvisable. Still, Dostoevsky’s “Underground Man” will listen to all of the evidence then simply ignore it out of spite expressed as, “I do not agree simply because I don’t want to.”Throughout the five hundred pages of Dickens’ work identified of “genius” the characters wander about seeking wealth and possessions much as they do in any cluster of nameless individuals wandering the environs of the present day. Lacking a superior basis for identity they point to the material evidences of wealth and proclaim: “This is me.” In attaining this mistaken goal the wealth and the inherent problems in sustaining such a wealth simply lead to a life beyond control. “The world is too much with us late and soon. Getting and spending we lay waste our powers. Little do we know of what is ours.” Wordsworth, the author of these words, alludes to a deep relationship to natural beauty. Clearly, not knowing what is ours, is anything but “Double plus good!” as a member of a luncheon group in “1984” might proclaim after sipping an insipid drivel.In summary, Charles Dickens writings remain as a source of thought for the modern day. At its conclusion, the novel seems to “peter out” as most lives do in spite of declarations to the contrary. Pip goes off to remake his fortune and other life changing effects are recorded in the final chapters. Other characters disappear, or their fates remain uncertain. These events will not be summarized here or what would be the reason to read the novel itself? Make certain to read the novel without the counsel of “experts” and simply developing a “trusting, personal relationship with teachers” as advised by cognitive learning experts of the present day. Rely and rethink on your own life experiences and those of your associates.Has there really been one hundred and fifty years of progress since the novel was published so that we could go back and counsel the needy? Or is the Pax Romana the best humanity can achieve?After all of this time is there still no - “And they lived happily ever after!”Your Old Buddy“Whizbang!!”

Yes, the paper is thin and the print on the reverse side shows through a little. That's too bad. But all the critical essays and footnotes are great to have—and they are, indeed, footnotes, located at the bottom of the pages, not endnotes exiled to a list at the back of the book. So it's an edition well worth having.

Good book! It came fast and it was in perfect condition. It provides a lot of guides and history after the story is finished and it also has both the original and alternative endings.

Reading this book as an adult was quite a different experience for me than reading it in school. A certain amount of life experience (read: bad choices) humanizes Pip's character and enriches the novel's understated conclusion. The Norton footnotes are extremely helpful.

I am using this for a literary group, the Dickens Fellowship. So it's an important, valuable edition to use while studying Dickens.The price was perfect as these Norton edition are expensive - so thank you for THAT. In great condition also!

A timeless classic

I purchased this edition for a course in the Victorian Period. Out of all the texts we had to purchase, this was by far the most thorough. And of course, it is my favorite Dickens novel, so I was thrilled to have all of the critical essays and primary source material that were included.

Excellent extras like essays and papers. Helpful for students.

Rosenberg is a penetrating editor; wide-ranging references and fascinating footnotes, without sacrificing clarity. I have a substantial Dickens collection in Penguin, Oxford and Norton, and the textual material (detailing this novel’s complete publication history from gestation to serialisation and ultimate book publication) in this Norton Critical Edition is some of the best. Highly recommended.

'Great Expectations' did meet my Expectations!Lovely scholarly annotations. I always go with The Norton Critical Editions for Academic Literature: the annotations half my work. Exceptional annotations.

The book lived up to all my ...err expectations. It arrived in good time and in good condition.

i needed this text for my studies and i’m so so happy with it, as i ordered it and it arrived two days after the purchase - but unfortunately it looked quite used, the corners of the texts were damaged and spine was cracked - as though it was preowned even though it was listed as brand new. it may have just been sitting in the warehouse for a while and had a bit of wear and tear. but super happy with the price point and fast arrival and all in all, LOVED THIS TEXT :)