Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

Hi everyone! 

I don't even know where to start when talking about my journey with this book. It was a challenge. It isn't the easiest to read but by the end I was used to the style and was just loving it! The storyline isn't at all what I would usually read. There was a romance but it wasn't or didn't feel like the central focus to me. And to be honest that's fair enough but I am used to romances when it comes to classics. 

I discovered one of my favourite characters ever, Miss Havisham. It think she is such an incredible, mysterious and fascinating character. I love her! Estella is also a wonderfully crafted character. 

If you had told me a year ago that I would read and not only that but enjoy a Charles Dickens novel I would have scoffed in your face. Charles Dickens was so intimidating! I feel like as he is so iconic of English literature, perhaps not as much as Shakespeare but still up there, you are expected to like him. One of my biggest inspirations for reading classics was down to Lucy Powrie the incredible author of The Paper And Hearts Society and she talks openly on her channel in some of her videos about how she doesn't LOVE Charles Dickens and I think that is something really big to say. I hoped I would love Great Expectations and I did. It is a real masterpiece. It has really encouraged me to read more Dickens too.

The reason I started reading it was down to school. We started watching the adaptation in class ahead of some studies on it. We were only going to read extracts from the original text and I felt that this was too good an opportunity to miss. So I got the book and during the Christmas holidays read it.

I ended up taking a break halfway through as I wanted to read something a little more light-hearted. So I read a book club book (Book Club obviously isn't happening at the moment so it may be a while before I can finish reading them and publish a post about them- please bare with me) in between. I then carried on with it.

In case you don't know what it is about, I will give a summary.

Pip is brought up by his sister and her husband. After a series of events including an escaped convict, a creepy lady who goes by the name of Miss Havisham and her beautiful daughter and a mysterious benefactor the identity of which isn't revealed until part way through the novel, he is off to London to become a gentleman.

He meets lots of people and grows up but soon his past catches up with him...

It is a real masterpiece that has stood the test of time so wonderfully. If you are a beginner in Dickens I think it is a good place to start or if you want to read more Dickens and haven't read Great Expectations then definitely do!

It was a joy to discover and I can't wait to carry on with my studies of it at school!