sees Miss Havisham as a fairy godmother and Estella as a princess that he has earned for saving the castle. Miss Havisham had adopted Estella, she had as good as adopted me, and it could not fail to be her intention to bring us together. She reserved it for me to restore the desolate house, admit the sunshine into the dark rooms, set the clocks a going and the cold hearths ablazing, tear down the cobwebs, destroy the vermin in short, do all the shining deeds of the young Knight of romance, and marry the Princess. (Dickens 253) Pip truly believes that Estella will be his until Magwich returns and ruins that idea. Pip is forced to reassess his expectations about class and gender because Estella is Magwichs daughter. He discovers that the woman who caused him the desire to become a gentleman, is nothing but the daughter of two criminals Truly it was impossible to dissociate her presence from all those wretched hankerings after money that had disturbed my boyhood from all those ill-regulated aspirations that had first made me ashamed of home and Joe (Dickens 257). Pips desire for Estella is more than just a love for her as she is. He is also in love with her beauty, money, status and prestige. All these things differentiate him from having the thick boots and course hands of a simple blacksmith boy. Estellas image and her character are bound up so tightly with status symbol and Pips own desire to rise that she is more of a symbol of a superior social status than that of a romantic love. Although it is possible that Pip really does love Estella, it seems that the status she carries as a prize is more important to him than her true being and her love and affection for him. The ambitions he had concerning elevating his social status to match Estellas own turn out to be false. Pip realizes that his dreams were false and that his actions were selfish as he grew older and gained a fortune from his unknown benefactor.The two novels are similar in...
