Why is miss havisham important

However when Pip realises what he is really seeing, the reader is informed of what seems to be the real of Miss Havisham. The adjectives used by Pip to describe objects are almost opposite in the second description, first the jewels were sparkly and then there was no brightness.

I think this description of the dress also parallels to a description of Miss Havisham when she was young and beautiful, and how her beauty faded during the years. I think that the fact that everything is turning yellow could represent how Miss Havisam is trying to fight past and how slowly she is loosing the battle. I think that Dickens decided to use Pip naivety, and change of opinion, to show haw quickly things can change, to represent how quickly things changed for Miss Havisham.

How sudden and unexpected that fatal moment was to her. Just how unexpected the second description by Pip was for the reader. The gesture of stopping the clocks at that same time, to me symbolises that her life stopped at that exact time. I think all these small gestures that could seem insane at first, symbolise hope.

When Miss Havisham invites Pip to come closer, Pip seems very shy and insecure. Miss Havisham comes across as some sort of disturbed drama queen. I think Miss Havisham put on this so called act to degrade Pip and make him feel uncomfortable, because she received personal pleasure from hurting people, just like when she had been hurt. At this point Miss Havishams personality begins to shine through. Miss Havisham is determined to make Pip fall in love with Estella, so that Estella could break his heart, just like her own was broken.

She keeps asking Pip what he thinks of Estella until she receives the response she wanted to here. I interpreted this hidden smile as a sign of victory, I think she feels she has achieved what she wanted and made Pip fall in love with Estella. However almost immediately what seemed a smile dropped to a brooding expression.

I think Dickens included this change of expression to show that however heartless Miss Havisham has seemed so far, doing this to Pip is making her comeback to reality and think back to her feelings and how hurt, sad and depressed she felt.

Near the end of the novel when Miss Havisham is near her death day, we see a radical change in her personality. Miss Havisham is an example of single-minded vengeance pursued destructively: both Miss Havisham and the people in her life suffer greatly because of her quest for revenge. Miss Havisham is completely unable to see that her actions are hurtful to Pip and Estella. SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook. Who are Estella's parents? Being Pip, he chooses to think the best, saying that he's pretty sure she didn't "reflect[ She was just trying to heal her broken heart in the only way she could.

The thing that catches our Shmoopy interest is that Miss Havisham's situation sounds a lot like Pip's: she lost her fortune and her special someone. But where Pip manages to become a better person because of it, Miss Havisham just goes nuts and ruins more people's lives.

The question is, why? Is she just a bad person because she grew up spoiled and rich? Or is it a problem of gender? Spoiler: we think so. After all, Miss Havisham can't exactly go off to Cairo and become a partner in a shipping firm.

Young, single women just couldn't do things like that in the nineteenth century; their options were marriage or, well, marriage. And because she was a lady, she couldn't go off and work, like Biddy—it would have been almost unthinkable for a rich or formerly rich daughter of a gentleman to do anything except maybe become a governess or another rich lady's companion—and even that would have been stretching it.

Did Miss Havisham really have another choice? Parents Home Homeschool College Resources.