that, Mrs. Joes hand trains Pips through violence and terror (41). Dickens emphasis is not on how Mrs. Joe nurtured Pip, but on how everything Pip learned from his sister is either supported or negated through physical violence. It doesnt take long for Pip to realize the injustice he is dealt by his sister. He knows innately that he isnt receiving the proper tools to pursue a happy life. Instead of being shipped to school, Pip is being tossed around like a connubial missile (7). Pip measures this injustice by comparing the physical and emotional abuse to things he could relate to. Like his rocking-horse that stands as many hands high," he measures his enormous pain in proportion to his small world. From the time that he was an infant he cherished a profound conviction that [his sister] bringing [him] up by hand gave her no right to bring [him] up by jerks (57). Dickens shared Pips feelings towards the abusive and emotionless upbringing of children. He illustrates this empathy by creating an environment for Pip which forces the reader to view Pip sympathetically:all the adults in Pips life, with the exception of the childlike Joe [believe] that children are naturally depraved and need to be corrected, kept in line with the Tickler, brought up by hand lest their natural willfulness assert itself in plots that are deviant, transgressive. (Brooks 128-9)A young child only has the adults in their life to learn from. If the adults havent been educated in the proper way to teach a child self worth, the child will suffer from poor self esteem and constantly struggle for approval from his peers. Pip looks at his coarse hands and prays to be someone else and somewhere else. Dickens uses the imagery of Pips coarse hands (56) to show that the only thing Pip has learned from most of the adults in his life is to despise himself as they despise him. Peter Brooks suggests that Dickens used the imagery of Mrs. Joes bringing up by hand and ...
