My students (and some of my friends) can't ever figure out why I love this novel so much. I explain how the characters are thoroughly original and yet timeless, how the symbolism is rich and tasty, and how the narrative itself is juicy and chock-full of complexity, but they just shake their heads at me in utter amazement and say, "What's wrong with you, dude?"

What's wrong, indeed.

I give them ten or fifteen years. Perhaps they'll have to read it again in college, or maybe they'll just try reading More...

Great Expectations…were formed...were met…and were thoroughly exceeded!

The votes have been tallied, all doubts have been answered and it is official and in the books ...I am a full-fledged, foaming fanboy of Sir Dickens and sporting a massive man-crush for literature’s master story-teller*.

*Quick Aside: My good friend Richard who despises “Chuckles the Dick” is no doubt having a conniption as he reads this…deep breaths, Richard, deep breaths.

After love, love, loving A Tale of Two Cities, I wen More...

I think this book may have made it official for me: I'm just not much of a Dickens fan.

My first introduction to Dickens was A Tale of Two Cities, which we were required to read in HS. It was also my first introduction to Cliff's Notes. :)

I tried Dickens again with Oliver Twist last year. It was abridged. I still could barely get through it, and ended up skipping ahead to the end -- something I almost never do.

It's not that Dickens' storylines aren't interesting to me, because they are. His cha More...

Whew, it took me an incredibly long time to finish this book. Actually, this book kind of fell somewhere between 3 and 4 stars but I rounded it up because I liked it better than David Copperfield. While it's true that this book can be somewhat tiresome and contrived at parts, Dickens' dry humour, beautifully haunting descriptions and unforgettable characters made it a really fun read for me. One approach that best be adopted in reading Great Expectations (and Dickens' novels in general) is not t More...

Presi la sua mano nella mia, e ci allontanammo da quelle rovine

Caro signor Charles,
noi ci siamo appena conosciuti. L’ho incontrata ieri sera, si ricorda? Ci hanno presentati, ci siamo stretti la mano. Lei ha fatto una battuta spiritosa e subito l’abbiamo vista prendere in mano la conversazione e animare la serata.
Come con tutte le persone che si conoscono da poco, io non ho poi capito se lei mi piaccia - se mi sia simpatico. Certo, è stato disinvolto e ha detto tante di quelle belle frasi. Ma More...

Recensione per i frivoli.

Orbene, chi pensate potrebbe essere Dickens, se vivesse ai nostri tempi?
Probabilmente un mix tra il regista di Beautiful, e il regista di una qualunque telenovela sudamericana.

I personaggi ci sono tutti. C’è quel paio di nuclei familiari attorno al quale la vicenda si muove, la contrapposizione tra il Bene e il Male, e l’effetto cliff-hanging, che ti tiene incollato alla vicenda grazie a rivelazioni spettacolari, (in cui si scopre che il figlio di Pilar, in realtà era More...

"...le nebbie della sera si alzarono ora, e in tutta l'ampia distesa di placida luce che mi mostrarono, non vidi nessuna parvenza di un'altra separazione da lei."

Mio Dio, che immensità. La completezza, l'interezza delle opere di Dickens è incommensurabile. E' un autore a trecentosessanta gradi; nei suoi libri c'è tutto: amicizia, amore, odio, rabbia, per poi andare alle sfumature, dalla gratitudine all' ingratitudine, e poi rimorso, tenerezza, umorismo, simpatia, pentimento. E speranza, of cours More...

“Grandi Speranze”- Charles Dickens (1860)

Si astengano dalla lettura di questa recensione tutti gli amanti di Dickens o chiunque abbia sinceramente apprezzato “Grandi Speranze”, vi avverto, non vi piacerà quello che scriverò.

Ho impiegato un mese a leggere questo libro, e quando ho bisogno di cosi tanto tempo le cause sono due, o sono impegnata in un'opera di 1200 pagine, oppure il libro non mi piace.

Per “Grandi Speranze”, purtroppo e a malincuore, è la seconda opzione:non mi è piaciuto,per nient More...

Admittedly, I can be a bit dismissive of the classics. By which I mean that many of my reviews resemble a drive-by shooting. This annoys some people, if measured by the responses I’m still getting to my torching of Moby Dick.

Even though I should expect some blowback, I still get a little defensive. I mean, no one wants to be called a “horrendous” person just because he or she didn’t like an overlong, self-indulgent, self-important “epic” about a douche-y peg leg and a stupid whale.

I’m no phili More...

Boring, dull, lifeless, and flat. This is so drawn out and boring I kept having to remind myself what the plot was.
Best to get someone else to sum up the story rather than undergo the torture of reading it.

Click here for Charles Dickens Disclaimer

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens is a wonderful story with many characters rich in diversity and complexity. From our lowly poor Pip who comes into money, to the quintessential tease, Estella, to the jilted bride Miss Havisham, and many others. Romance, love, betrayal, murder, and suspense are just a few of the aspects of this story, but are not even needed to draw you in. Dickens has created here a tapestry of a multitude of storylines, all touchin More...

It's the book that turned me off of Dickens. I still shudder when I think of being forced to read it in high school. The descriptions just go on forever...make it stop!

Pip, an orphan, meets an escaped convict and treats him kindly. This simple action will change Pip's life forever. Pip falls in love with Estella, a cold-hearted girl, who, thanks to bitter Miss Havisham, has been well-trained as a heartbreaker. She is wealthy and looks down on Pip, a poor boy with no expectations.

When a mysterio More...

It's hard to review a classic. People have been reviewing Great Expectations for 150 years. I found out not all the original reviews were positive but sometimes time is in your favor when it comes to reviews.

The only other Dickens novel I have read is A Christmas Carol. I have read that book a million times. I have started, but not finished, other books by Dickens. I was hesitant to start this and I wondered if I could finish it. For some reason, Dickens has always intimidated me and I'm not sur More...

I see more in this book each time I read it. Class distinctions, friendships, character development, sin, repentance, forgiveness, redemption--all are explored and charted in this thirteenth novel of Dickens.

My favorite characters are Joe Gargery, the gentle and loving blacksmith; the faithful Herbert Pocket; and the helpful Mr. Wemmick and his Aged P.

I've been seeing a recurring theme in several of Dickens' novels--a degrading reliance on hopes of the future to the detriment of the duties and More...

Even if you haven't read this or seen any of the many movie or tv adaptations, you would know something of the story. This is the one about Pip, an escaped convict, a beautiful but cruel girl called Estella, and the corpse-like Miss Havisham. It's about a little boy called Pip who was raised by his much older sister, Mrs Joe, and her husband, Joe, the village blacksmith. Joe is a role model and father figure as well as Pip's best friend, while Mrs Joe is sharp-tongued and aggressive - between he More...

Credited by many as the inventor of the modern novel, there are actually a number of books by Dickens I've read and enjoyed over the years; this one, however, is the latest I've re-read, which is why I'm doing a review of it and not the others. A master storyteller of the Victorian Age, someone imminently readable today as well (unlike so many of those 'olden' authors), Dickens had a magical ability to scoop up every detail of his time's zeitgeist, and spit it back out in a series of thrilling c More...

This review contains very general spoilers; and as a precaution, I've hid the entire thing.

(view spoiler)[Harkening back to its original publication history, I read Great Expectations as an accelerated serial: one installment a day, over the span of two months. Accordingly, I was able to garner an appreciation for Dickens' pacing, and savour every tension-wrought cliff-hanger. I also didn't notice how the novel's mood was gradually being darkened by imperceptible degrees; so when I reached the end I was shocke (hide spoiler)] More...

Really nice book.
Unfortunately, I read it at the age of 11 so it was quite a trauma for me, a story of a boy who indirectly lives on his own and have this creepy monster as a sister and I felt so sorry for him and wanted to stop because it made me too depressed (still, 11 year old) but I continued anyway, that's when I read about the dark house of M. (this time I mean Monster or MareBride) and its picture scared the he'll outta me, again, I wanted to stop reading, but I decide to give it a last More...

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens is a masterpiece, as great as it gets!

This is the first novel I ever read, and how is that for a start? :|

It has a storyline with which I can relate to in its fullest sense, I laugh with Pip and I cry with him. It is almost as if his emotions are mine.

I travel with him to London and when I come back home I hear the death news of my elder sister. SubhanAllah I literally feel my sister has passed away!

All in all, it is a novel to have in possession. The re More...

First read in high school.
Second read at University.
Might have to try again.

I remember hating it the first time. Really enjoying it the second time. I have the suspicion that at school they have us read things too early.

= = = = = = =

Aug 2011: Third time as an audio book, courtesy of Librivox: here

I love the way the perceptions change. Pip as a young man sees things in one way; Pip as an adolescent, then as a young man in another way. All captured so perfectly.

Favorite characters: Mr Wemmick More...

Is there a way to give negative stars?

Let's see, hmmmm, boy is poor. Boy falls in love with well-to-do girl. Boy reforms well. Girl is manipulated to dump boy in a predictable fashion. Lot's of words in between. Boy is chopped up by a meat cleaver and his cadaver is launched into space by hot aire balloon. Space chimps reconstruct boy and send him back to Earth. He lands on miss Havisham. Her toes curl up like a wicked witch... admit it this review is already better than the book.

Why is Charles More...

I hadn't read this in at least 30 years, and I decided to try an experiment: I'd read it as it's very first readers did--in 36 weekly installments. I looked up on the interweb where the breaks were, and marked them in my copy. (I'll admit I cheated towards the end as the story picked up speed--but I still always quit at a break.) It was fascinating to watch how Dickens would maintain interest in each installment, either by adding a new character or a new location, or adding a new difficulty, and More...

Ganz großartig. Unglaublich, wie er die Geschichte entwickelt und welch überraschend abstruse Wendungen diese immer wieder nimmt.
[Update] Inzwischen in das letzte Drittel vorgedrungen. Weiter sehr angetan. Auf der Metaebene find ich persönlich interessant: so viele Verben ...
[Update nach Ende] Sehr guter Anhang! Insgesamt absolut empfehlenswert. Wer immer schon mal wissen wollte, was es mit diesem Dickens auf sich hat, der nehme diese Ausgabe zur Hand.

'Great Expectations' was a strange read, and I'm not sure if I enjoyed it or not. The writing I loved - the narrative is full of sinister comedy, witty dialogue and striking imagery and observations from the word go, and the majority of characters (from the ridiculous to terrifying) are hard not to adore and leave undoubtedly impressioned marks. The pacing, however was extremely unbalanced. Normally, the middle part of a novel would be expected to be the most exciting, yet in this case it was so More...

I readly did like this book it took me a mounth couse it was very long it had a lot of pages. I dont remember how many but to read this you have to have a lot of time on your hands. It was a little hard to understand at first but in the end it all makes sence. I read it beacause I was told that with my vocabulay I could understand it. I did understand but there were a few words I had to ask about. This book is old and in old books alot of the times there is big words but if you are and advied re More...

alright, well i'm still reading this.... but one thing i'd have to say is that this book would be so much better if Dickens wasnt paid by the word, and if we didnt have to read it for school.

the plot, if you read it, is actually interesting.. just the giganto amount of words that are unneeded make the book extremely confusing.

I'd never read this book—really I hadn't; I'd have remembered—so why, from the first page, did it feel so familiar? Finally, as I proceeded, I realized that I'd seen the modern adaptation, set in New York, starring Ethan Hawke as 'Pip' (the movie had changed the names, as well), Gwyneth Paltrow as Estella, and Robert de Niro as Abel Magwitch. It was a memorable movie, but the part I'd remembered best was the ending, where Pip and Estella eventually shed the expectations imposed on them by well-m More...

I finished! it's really good, a lot more humorous than I expected. I loved the story, and many of the characters are unforgettable, like Miss Havisham and Aged P. and Wemmick. And it confirms my philosophy of life, which I can't put into words, but Dickens has.