Do You Have Great Expectations?

I am currently reading, for the first time, Charles Dickens’s masterpiece, Great Expectations, and thus far it is exceeding the expectations I had for it. I have been tempted—guilted?—to read the book for some time, ever since I read the following anecdote from Leland Ryken’s Realms of Gold: The Classics in Christian Perspective:

Had I really heard what I seemed to have heard, or had my end-of-the-semester paranoia made me imagine things? David, a bright and godly student on the verge of graduation from college, had just said to me, “In my last semester in college I could not justify the time it would take to read Great Expectations.”

I said nothing. I was shocked. The chasm between David and me was so great on this subject that it took me a long time to grasp it. How could anyone not justify taking time to read Great Expectations? I wondered. Or Homer’s Odyssey and many other indispensable, life-changing books? What accounts for the difference between David’s attitude and mine? Most obviously, I have acquired a taste for literary classics and David has not. To me they are treasures that I cannot live without. This is an acquired taste only in the sense that people must read these books before they are captivated by them. Once we open ourselves to their beauty and power, they can be trusted to win us. David did not reject the classics because he found them lacking but because he left them unread.

In addition to picking up a cheap version of the print book—along with reading through Leland Ryken’s guide to the book— I’ve also been listened to Simon Prebble’s fantastic narration (a British accent is certainly helpful for a book like this), which Audible.com currently has on sale for $0.99 (I’m not sure how long that lasts).

[Update: Mark Ward clarifies: You can get the 99-cent price if you "buy" the $0.00 Kindle version at Amazon (click here). Once you "purchase" it, you will see an option to add the audio narration for 99 cents.]

Don’t watch the latest movie version till you read the book, but here is a 2012 version which looks good, starring Helena Bonham Carter as Miss Havisham and Ralph Fiennes as the convict Magwitch: