Social class in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

Of all Charles Dickens’s treatments of social class in his novels, that presented in “Great Expectations” is the most radical and thorough. Indeed, many commentators have seen this book as the supreme exploration of the topic in Victorian literature.

Social class, and the allied topics of social upheaval and mobility, reached its peak as a matter of artistic concern in the Victorian era. The Industrial Revolution had created a vast new underclass of urban factory workers and another new class of “nouveau riche” social climbers who owned the factories and profited from the labours of their employees. These social distinctions ran in parallel with the old social class system of landed gentry and rural poor, which in turn derived from the medieval feudal system.

Dickens himself was something of a social climber. He was personally ashamed of certain aspects of his past, such as his time as a child worker in a blacking factory, and had always dreamed of bettering himself. In 1856 he had bought a country house in Kent (Gad’s Hill) which he had seen many times in his childhood when taken on walks by his father, and he had often fantasised about living in it one day. His writing of “Great Expectations” (1860-1) coincided with his taking up permanent residence at Gad’s Hill, thus realising a “great expectation” of his own.

“Great Expectations” was written the year after Samuel Smiles published his highly influential “Self-Help”, which encouraged people from the lower middle class to practice thrift and self-improvement and thus give themselves a social boost. The monthly parts of Dickens’s new novel would therefore have been read by many people who had expectations of their own, great or otherwise.

The central character of “Great Expectations” is Pip (his own childhood attempt to pronounce his name, Philip Pirrip). He lives with his elder sister who is married to a village blacksmith, to whom Pip becomes apprenticed. These are honest, hard-working people with no social aspirations of their own and who do not deserve the misfortunes that befall them later in the novel.

Pip’s first encounter with people from a higher social class is when he is invited to visit an eccentric old lady, Miss Havisham, who lives in the grand Satis House, which she keeps in exactly the same state as it was on the day she was jilted at the altar many years before. Living with her is her ward, Estelle, whom Miss Havisham is bringing up to despise all men. It soon becomes clear that Pip’s function is to be enchanted by Estelle (which he is) and then rejected. Our view of the upper class, as seen through these women, is therefore a highly prejudiced one, as it comprises people for whom the lower class are there to be used as tools for their own ends.

However, Pip is then told that he has “great expectations” of his own, thanks to an unknown benefactor, whom he naturally believes to be Miss Havisham. In this he is wrong, because the sudden promotion in wealth and class status comes to him courtesy of a convict, Magwitch, whom Pip had helped as a child and who has made his fortune in Australia, to which he had been transported.

By giving Pip the chance to raise his social status, albeit anonymously, Magwitch seeks to do, through Pip, what he could never do for himself, namely become a gentleman. However, gentility is not so easy to acquire simply through the gaining of wealth, and this is the central message of the book. Pip’s response to his change of status is to think himself better than those people on whom he has depended for his whole life to date, and he becomes a snob who is lucky to hold on to the few true friends he has.

Magwitch, who has escaped from his sentence and returned to England to find Pip, gets a very different reception from the one he had expected. Far from being welcomed with open arms by the gentleman he has created, he finds that Pip’s overriding concern is that Magwitch should leave as soon as possible. Neither Pip not Magwitch have understood what being a gentleman entails.

What we have in “Great Expectations”, therefore, is a set of “dos and don’ts” relating to the class system. Dickens was a man of his time in that he believed that social distinctions mattered. He did not take the line of his contemporary (and fellow Londoner) Karl Marx, who wished to give political power to the underclass. Instead, Dickens pointed to the morality of what was right and wrong in terms of social expectations.

For one thing, the behaviour of Miss Havisham and Estelle is unacceptable, and Estelle is brought to realise this. Being socially superior does not give one the right to play games with the feelings and emotions of those less fortunate.

On the other hand, social class is not something that can be bought and sold, which is the mistake made by Magwitch. In the last analysis, morality is more important than class. Pip’s aspirations are noble, in that education, social refinement and material advancement are desirable goals, in the “Self-Help” tradition, but he goes about achieving these things in the wrong way. Ultimately, it is the people in one’s life who matter, whatever their social class, and it is always wrong to forget those people when one’s own aspirations are met.

In “Great Expectations”, by showing that Pip’s expectations are founded on self-deception, Dickens was able to present an incisive assessment of the Victorian achievement. No novel of the Victorian era, by any writer who tackled the question of social class, did a better job of portraying the subtle interplay of class, character and morality than “Great Expectations”.

© John Welford

84 Charing Cross Road: a review

A review of a short book that is a joy to read, and which was made into a highly successful stage play and film.

84 Charing Cross Road

“84 Charing Cross Road” was published in 1971 by Helene Hanff (1916-97), an American writer of TV scripts and magazine articles whose reputation depends almost solely on this one short book of fewer than 100 pages. However, the gentle humour of the book, depending in part on an American and a Brit getting to learn about each other’s preoccupations and customs, has had a lasting appeal on both sides of the Atlantic.

The address in question was that of Marks and Co, a small bookshop in central London that specialised in out-of-print titles. The “Co” was short for “Cohen”, one of the joint owners, and not “Company”. Helene Hanff wrote a letter from New York in October 1949 to the bookshop, inspired by an advertisement in the “Saturday Review of Literature”, to ask if they could supply any of the books she wanted on an enclosed list. The bookshop replied, Helene replied to the bookshop’s letter, and so began a correspondence that was to last for twenty years. It is the letters from Helene and the replies she received that comprise the book.

Most of the letters from Marks and Co were written by their chief buyer, Frank Doel, whose death in 1969 brought the correspondence to an end and gave Helene the inspiration to collect all the letters together as a book. Some of the letters were presumably lost, because there are some long gaps in the chronology at places, and mention is sometimes made of events that have clearly been referred to in letters that are not part of the collection.

As time passes, the formality of the earliest letters breaks down and they become much more friendly in tone, with mention made of more personal matters than just the buying and selling of books. The ice is cracked quite early on when Helene, in only her second letter, adds as a PS: “I hope Madam doesn’t mean over there what it does here”.

Before the end of 1949 Helene has offered to send a gift of food to the staff at Marks and Co, as Britain was still suffering from post-war rationing. These gifts continued into the 1950s and were very well received by the bookshop staff, some of whom wrote their own letters back to Helene, these being generally more chatty than those written by Frank Doel.

However, even Frank’s letters gradually turn more personal, although he never loses his professionalism when it comes to discussing books that he is able to offer Helene or which he regrets he has not been able to find.

The discussion of books is, not surprisingly, a recurrent theme in the letters, and Helene is clearly a true book-lover in that she enjoys the look, feel and smell of old books as well as the words they contain. She sometimes gets annoyed when the wrong edition of a book is sent, but also waxes lyrical with joy when she finds evidence that a previous owner has enjoyed a book just as much as she is doing. She would have hated to own a Kindle!

A theme that soon enters the correspondence is Helene’s desire to visit London, and the bookshop, as soon she can afford to do so. Letters are exchanged between Helene and Frank’s wife Nora, discussing how she might be accommodated when she arrives, but something always crops up that prevents this from happening.

The tragedy of the book is that, with no warning of any health issues on the horizon, Helene receives a letter in 1969 to announce that Frank Doel has died from a ruptured appendix. The final letters are between Helene, Nora and Frank’s daughter (from his first marriage) Sheila.

The beauty of this book is the development of the friendship between Helene and Frank, his family and colleagues. There is real warmth in these pages, and the reader knows that, had they ever been able to meet, Helene and Frank would have been very good friends. The reader also feels that all the people encountered in the book are well-rounded characters whom it would have been a real pleasure to know.

Helene Hanff wrote a sequel to the book which is a diary of her eventual visit to London in 1971, after “84 Charing Cross Road” had been published and she became a minor celebrity on the strength of it. By this time the bookshop had closed and Helene could only visit the empty shell and imagine how it would have looked when her letters were being delivered to it. The second book was entitled “The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street” and was published in 1974.

84 Charing Cross Road was made into a stage play (in 1981) and a film starring Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins in 1987.

Incidentally, Charing Cross Road is still a good place to shop for books, both new and second-hand, although the site of “84”, as pictured, is now part of a fast-food restaurant.

© John Welford

Barnaby Rudge (by Charles Dickens) and autism

Barnaby Rudge was the fifth novel published by Charles Dickens (1812-70). It appeared in weekly parts in his short-lived journal Master Humphrey’s Clock, the final episode being printed in November 1841.

It cannot be denied that Barnaby Rudge is far from being one of Charles Dickens’s best known novels. It has never had the popular adulation of his other early novels, such as Oliver Twist or Nicholas Nickleby, and even Dickens would have admitted that it was not one of his better works. For one thing, a novel in which the title character is absent from the action for 19 consecutive chapters has surely got a serious flaw in terms of its structure.

Despite the book’s problems as a novel, the title character is a figure of considerable interest. Barnaby is put forward as a naïve character who is easily led astray, which is why he gets caught up in the anti-Catholic Gordon Riots of 1780 and is nearly hanged as a result. However, when one looks closely at the actions and demeanour of Barnaby, it soon becomes clear that Dickens is describing someone who is autistic, at a time when the condition was unknown and its sufferers were likely to be classed as “idiots” or mentally unsound, and therefore not worth taking seriously.


Autism

Autistic behaviour relates to an inability to abstract concepts from experiences and thus to link cause and effect or to plan for the future. The basic building blocks are present in the brain but they are not put together correctly. The comedian Eric Morecambe once famously remarked that he was “playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order”, and autism is something like that.

When one examines the typical characteristics of autism, and compares them with the text of Barnaby Rudge, one can see that Dickens must have known, at first hand, one or more people with the condition in order for him to be able to depict his character so convincingly.

It has to be remembered that there is a spectrum of autistic behaviour, such that individuals may be slightly or severely affected, or fall anywhere in between the extremes. This means that sufferers may exhibit some of the typical symptoms but not others, or they may display most of the recognised autistic behaviours but only to a mild degree. However, Barnaby Rudge does seem to tick most of the boxes when his behaviour is measured against the common definitions of autism.

It is clear that Dickens does not think that Barnaby is mentally defective. In chapter 25, for example, he mentions how Barnaby’s mother regards him, describing his actions when a child as deriving from something “not of dullness but of something infinitely worse, so ghastly and unchildlike in its cunning”.


Typical symptoms of autism as displayed by Barnaby Rudge

Autistic people often find it difficult to sustain personal relationships at an emotional level. Barnaby does not appear to be particularly close to his mother (who believes that she has long been widowed and therefore lives alone with Barnaby) and is perfectly happy to abandon her to join the rioters. He treats individual rioters alike as friends, whether he has known them for years or only five minutes. The one creature to whom he shows true affection is not human at all, namely his pet raven Grip whom Barnaby regards as his brother and from whom he is never parted (incidentally, it was this raven that inspired Edgar Allan Poe to write his famous poem “The Raven”).

A symptom of autism is sticking rigidly to a routine, even when circumstances change such that the action in question makes little sense. This tendency in Barnaby is noticed by the rioters, one of whom remarks that he “can be got to do anything, if you take him the right way”. Tasked with guarding a stable, and armed only with a flag, Barnaby continues to march up and down until overcome by a band of soldiers. The idea of running away from danger never crosses his mind.

Another indication is being unaware of the behaviour that is expected of one’s age and situation. This can be revealed as childish behaviour that continues into later life, such as a delight in toys and hobbies such as collecting car numbers, or, as in Barnaby’s case, an inability to make a distinction between humans and non-humans in terms of social status. His devotion to Grip the raven has been mentioned above, but this also takes the form of Grip being elevated above him in the pecking order: “He’s the master and I’m the man”.

Autistic people often show unusual degrees of sensitivity to sights and sounds. Barnaby is described at one point as “shutting out the light with his hands”, and at another as being able to recognise the sound of the footsteps of a dog as well of as its master.

Although being susceptible to panic attacks is not confined to those on the autistic spectrum, it is a regularly found symptom in such people. Barnaby’s mother recalls his “strange imaginings” and “terror of certain senseless things” in childhood. At one point he is anxious about the plotting and hatching that he imagines being done by clothes blowing about on a washing line, and at another he wonders about the motives of sparks from the fire as they ascend the chimney. This display of anxiety is therefore coupled with the typical autistic inability to distinguish between animate and inanimate objects and to anthropomorphise the latter.

Hyperactivity and abnormal movements are sometimes a symptom of autism. Barnaby’s mother remarks on his restlessness, and he thinks nothing of walking the twelve miles from Southwark to Chigwell, or of spending the whole day wandering through the countryside.

Speech abnormalities are common in autism. Barnaby sometimes loses the power of speech when excited, or he finds it difficult to express complex meanings. As with a number of the symptoms of autism, this is by no means unique to the condition and it is a common cause of confusion between autism and other forms of mental disability. Many autistic people have suffered discrimination because they have been labelled as “idiots” due to being unable to speak clearly, but it is noticeable that Barnaby’s friends know full well that this is not the case and that Barnaby understands situations as well as they do, if not better.

As should be clear from the above, autism is not synonymous with lack of intelligence, and many autistic people have been known to be extremely gifted in terms of abilities in limited areas. For example, the current writer has a relative who is severely autistic but has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the London Underground system. Barnaby’s special gifts include the ability to train his pet raven and to remember the faces and names of people whom he has not seen for many years.


Charles Dickens and autism

Charles Dickens conveys all of this knowledge of autism in his character of Barnaby Rudge, so the question remains of how he was able to do so when the condition was a hundred years or more from being recognised as such by the medical establishment. He may well have come across autistic people in his life and made careful mental notes of their behaviour. Some of his previously written characters might also be thought of as autistic to a greater of lesser degree. For example, Bill Sikes in Oliver Twist is never seen without his dog Bullseye, who appears to be the only creature to whom he shows any affection. A better case might be made for Smike in Nicholas Nickeby, who has suffered years of abuse from Wackford Squeers for being similar to Barnaby Rudge in a number of respects, but who is quite capable of being a close friend to Nicholas.

An even more fascinating thought is that Charles Dickens recognised many of these symptoms in himself, and that Barnaby is, to some extent, a self-portrait. It is known, for example, that Dickens would spend many hours wandering the streets of London at night, in a mirror image of Barnaby wandering the countryside during the day. Dickens did not find it easy to sustain personal relationships, with his marriage ending eventually in separation. Above all, perhaps, his single-minded pursuit of his craft, involving countless hours in the activity of writing to a punishing schedule as he completed each weekly or monthly part of his latest novel, might be construed as an autistic activity.

Indeed, it might be said that had Dickens not been so obsessively meticulous in observing his fellow human beings, he might not have been able to create characters such as Barnaby Rudge. Such accuracy and attention to detail perhaps require one to be somewhere on the autistic spectrum oneself.

© John Welford

Geoffrey Chaucer's Retraction of his Canterbury Tales

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer end on a rather strange note, namely 350 words (or thereabouts) under the heading “Heere taketh the makere of this book his leve”, which is usually referred to as “Chaucer’s Retraction”. This is both a revocation of all Chaucer’s works that might have caused offence and a dedication to God of those that have not. Chaucer thus appears to divide his works into two groups, those towards which he feels a degree of shame and those that he thinks are worthy of being dedicated to the praise of God.

The list for which an apology seems to be in order is particularly interesting. He groups them as “translacions and enditynges of worldly vanitees,” mentioning not only those Canterbury tales “that sownen into synne” but also some works that seem quite inoffensive. These include “The Book of the Duchess”, “The House of Fame”, “The Parliament of Fowls”, “The Legend of Good Women”, and “Troilus and Criseyde”, plus the unknown “Book of the Lion” which presumably was a work of which no manuscript has survived.

On the “good” side of the ledger are his translation of the “Consolations of Philosophy” by Boethius, “and othere bookes of legendes of seintes, and omelies and moralitee, and devocioun.” Chaucer seems to want to do a deal with Jesus, Mary and the saints of Heaven, to the effect that these works earn him sufficient grace to “biwayle my giltes” and undo the harm of those on the other side of the balance.

To our modern way of thinking, Chaucer seems to have got this all wrong. If the world had only been left with the “good” books, then it is highly unlikely that we would have heard of Geoffrey Chaucer at all. We can assume that the “sinful” Canterbury Tales would include those of the Miller and the Reeve, for starters, with their stories of bed-hopping, and of the Friar and the Summoner, with their coarse jibing at each other. However, the retraction is not just of downright sin but of all worldly vanities, and the common theme of the named “non-Canterbury” books is romantic love, in one guise or another. Take all these away from the Canterbury Tales, and nothing much is left apart from those of the Parson and Chaucer’s own “Tale of Melibee”, which are generally regarded as the two least readable of the Tales. We do not need such an apology.

However, this is to misread Chaucer’s intention. He was a highly moral person, indeed moralistic at times, but was also a great humourist and very human. He had a well developed sense of fun and mischief as well as a deep sense of respect for the foibles of his fellow travellers, not only on the Canterbury pilgrimage but on the journey of life. Many writers throughout history have combined these two aspects of personality, and some have been able to reconcile them better than others. I believe that this Retraction is Chaucer’s attempt to make this reconciliation.

Another possibility is that Chaucer underwent some sort of religious conversion towards the end of his life, possibly during the period of writing the Canterbury Tales, and that his growing sense of mortality (he died in 1400 at the age of about 60) had focused his mind on the fate of his immortal soul. This would not have been unusual for his age. Chaucer’s Italian near-contemporary Boccaccio, whose “Decameron” has much in common with the Canterbury Tales, renounced his frivolous and licentious works in middle life and wrote nothing but learned treatises in Latin in his later years. Can we put Chaucer in the same bracket?

If this is the case, and I am not convinced that it is, then surely Chaucer is being unduly hard on himself, certainly on the evidence of the Canterbury Tales. Agreed, there is vulgarity and indecency in places, but Chaucer is a realist, painting 14^th century life as he sees it, with all its earthiness, dirt and crudity. He is never morbid or unhealthy, and he sees life in a true perspective. He is always quick to point to the moral of a story, and those who do wrong usually get their comeuppance one way or another. There may be a few cases in which people who play cruel tricks get away with it, such as Alison in the Miller’s Tale, but Chaucer is happy to forgive the high-spirited deeds of a young woman who will doubtless settle down in later life. He is less sympathetic towards the Wife of Bath, for example, whose middle-aged feminist posturing stretches his liberalism just a little bit too far. As mentioned above, he is always a moralist as well as a humanist.

So was Chaucer right to “retract” or not? Did he really mean it? Or is this just a form of words designed to put him on the side of the sheep rather than the goats at the Day of Judgment? At a distance of 700 years, it is not easy to say. However, we can at least be grateful that Chaucer left us a body of work that we can still enjoy today, both “sinful” and otherwise.

© John Welford