Pip (Great Expectations - Charles Dickens)

Member Name: AlKal

Product:	Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
Date:	22/02/01 (50 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Best introduction to Dickens

Disadvantages: The films are easier

Endlessly filmed and refilmed, this is one of the most atmospheric and compelling books that I've read by Dickens. Very unusually for me, I read it over a weekend. Its easy to read and some of the more irritating digressions and ridiculousnesses of a lot of his other books are missing altogether.

If you've seen David Lean's movie of the book, (not the rubbish modern one made a few years ago!) you have a good idea of what makes it work - evokes childhood really well; conjures up the gloomy atmosphere of the North Kent marshes amazingly (trust me I was born there); has his usual gift at doing grotesque and overblown characters; and closes with one of the most amazing chases long before cinema took up that hobby.

The obsession with class is difficult for us to take I think after 150 years, but the book is basically about the importance of transcending these divisions and rediscovering the importance of kindness

Fantastic.


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