Summary
Pip, in his fourth year of apprenticeship, joins Joe at the Jolly Bargemen, where they listen to Wopsle expound on a criminal story in the newspaper. A strange man takes issue with Wopsle's comments and proceeds to destroy his arguments. The man repeatedly bites his forefinger and throws his forefinger toward Wopsle as he makes his points. Pip recognizes him as the soap-scented man from Miss Havisham's. The man asks to speak to Joe and Pip, so they return home and sit in the state parlor. He tells them his name is Jaggers, and he is a lawyer from London with news for Pip. The young man is to come into a handsome property and therefore has great expectations. Joe and Pip are both astounded. Pip views this as his dream come true, and Pip thinks it is Miss Havisham's doing because this man is her lawyer. The two conditions to his expectations are that he must keep the name of Pip and not ask the name of his benefactor. That person will step forward when the time is right. Jaggers mentions that Pip should study with someone to learn to be a gentleman and mentions Matthew Pocket, a relative of Miss Havisham's. Jaggers is clear that he makes no recommendations, but merely gives the information. He further states that, in this matter, he is paid or he would not be there, and if his opinion were asked, he would not have recommended this gift. When Jaggers badgers Joe about financial compensation for losing Pip in the forge, Joe is insulted and is ready to fight Jaggers.
Joe struggles to control his sadness that evening, and Pip is angry with him for being sad. Yet Pip also gets angry when Joe and Biddy manage to show genuine happiness for him and ask about his preparations. When Pip heads to town to get a new suit of clothes he observes that even the cows in the pasture seem to view him more respectfully. Trabb, the tailor, cannot be helpful enough and yells at his assistant for not being respectful enough to Pip. Even Pumblechook falls all over Pip. The pompous man shakes his hand, feeds him, and pretends that they were great friends when Pip was a child.
Pip speaks to Biddy about trying to work with Joe to be less backward in his learning and manners so he will be ready when Pip "elevates" him. Biddy observes that perhaps Joe is aware of what he is and is happy and dignified filling that role with respect. Pip gets angry, accusing her of jealousy, and remarks that he will not ask anything more of her. She apologizes if she has given any slight and notes that whatever he feels toward her, it will not change what she feels for him. She does observe though that "a gentleman should not be unjust neither."
Before leaving, Pip wears his clothes to Miss Havisham's where he succeeds in making Sarah Pocket jealous. Miss Havisham feeds his belief that she is his fairy godmother. On the day of his departure, Pip asks to leave alone, not wanting to be seen with Joe and Biddy when he greets the stage in his new clothes. He tries to be indifferent about leaving, but cries as he walks away. On the coach, he struggles with mixed feelings about the way he left and considers getting off the coach and returning to make amends. However, he cannot decide, and after a bit, the coach has gone too far to go back.
Analysis
Description, repetition, and tags abound. Jaggers' tags include his watch chain, bushy eyebrows, the black dots of his beard, and his habit of biting his forefinger. He repeats his instructions that he deals only in facts, makes no recommendations, and wants everyone clear on what to expect and not expect from him. Jaggers is an honest and up-front man. He is not a warm person, but he is a much more honorable one than Mrs. Joe ever was with her emotional games and blackmail. Other tags are Pumblechook's "May I?" every time he shakes Pip's hand, and Sarah Pocket's walnut-shell countenance, which in her jealousy of Pip has now gone from brown to green and yellow.
Joe's emotional depth is beautifully revealed in these chapters. "Joe laid his hand upon my shoulder with the touch of a woman. I have often thought of him since, like the steam-hammer, that can crush a man or pat an eggshell, in his combination of strength with gentleness." Joe is comfortable with both sides of his emotions and he is clear about his priorities in life. The man's heart is breaking at losing Pip: Dickens shows this when Joe scoops his eyes trying not to cry and silently grips his knees as he sits in front of the fire struggling to control his emotions. His fierce love for Pip is seen when he is ready to take Jaggers apart for insinuating that any amount of money could ever replace Pip. Yet the gentleness returns immediately when Pip takes him aside to calm him.
It is unclear who wins the prize for boorishness in these chapters: Pip or Pumblechook. The connection between these two is that at least for part of the book, they are very much alike. Pip, in coming into property, becomes just like Pumblechook. Pumblchook falls all over Pip, constantly asking "May I" and trying to shake his hand. He feeds him, offers to take care of Joseph in his "deficiency," and twists the memories of Pip's childhood to represent himself as sporting with the infant Pip and playing their "boyish games of sums." Pumblechook even remarks of Mrs. Joe, "let us never be blind to her faults of temper," in his attempts to ingratiate himself to Pip. He also suggests that investing capital in his business would be welcomed especially because, as he reminds Pip, he is "the humble instrument of leading up to this." Pumblechook never misses a moment to take the credit for something and the way he treats someone changes with their financial status. This foreshadows a similar change when Pip is a gentleman.
Pip observes how money changes things: how much nicer Mr. Trabb, the tailor, treats him and how much trouble Trabb's boy gets into when he is not respectful enough to Pip. At home, Pip's behavior is pompous and snobbish. While he has moments of sadness, for example, when he feels he will miss his room, he spends his time being peevish to Biddy and Joe. Pip is irritable when they are sad at his leaving, and he is irritable when they are happy for his good fortune. There is no pleasing him. He is condescending to Biddy in his desire to improve Joe and cannot understand that Joe is worthy of respect. Biddy's response to him, while appropriate, merely infuriates Pip. He is projecting onto them his own base behaviors, and instead of seeing how badly he is acting, he convinces himself they are the ones who are jealous and behaving badly. Biddy shows true dignity, restraint, and compassion when she kindly defends Joe, apologizes to Pip, and tells Pip her feelings toward him will always be the same. In a brilliant yet subtle way, however, she lets him know that he is wrong and that even though he is a gentleman, he has no right to misjudge people and treat them badly. Pip is almost sickening when he magnanimously "forgives" Biddy. The extent of his delusions is apparent when he thinks that even the cattle in the field view him with a new level of respect. The struggle between good and evil in him is evident in the moments when Pip has second thoughts about his behavior, such as when he ponders getting out of the coach and going home to say a better good-bye. However the shallowness of his character at this point in his life wins out. Waiting until it is too late to go back, he shrugs off personal responsibility and "overcomes" his moment of goodness.
Glossary
Timon of Athens and Coriolanus two of Shakespeare's plays. The hero of the first is known for speaking abusively and the hero of the second, the beadle, is known for arrogance.
settle a long wooden bench with a back and armrests.
subterfuge any plan, action, or device used to hide one's true objective or evade a difficult or unpleasant situation. When Jaggers discounts Wopsle's conclusions about a murder Wopsle is discussing, the rest of the people listening start to question whether Wopsle has an ulterior motive in drawing the conclusions he has.
Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is a better a proverb meaning that silence is better than boasting.
expostulatory having to do with an earnest objecting.
obtruded offered or forced upon others unasked.
the rich man and the kingdom of Heaven Pip is uncomfortable because the clergyman in church reads this Bible passage right after Pip finds out he has come into wealth. The Bible reference is Matthew 19:24: "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God."
the change come so oncommon plump a change coming so suddenly and all at once. Joe is commenting on how the news of Pip's expectations just caught him off guard at first, but after a night's sleep he is dealing better with it.
collation a light meal.
apostrophising the fowl the British spelling of the word "apostrophizing," which means the addressing of someone or something, as in a speech or play. Pumblechook is speaking to the chicken that he is about to eat, about Pip's good fortune.
hand-portmanteau a traveling case or bag.
