Great Expectations - Charles Dickens - Chapter three

It's the morning of a damp day, and Pip goes to meet the mysterious man. All the way to the Battery, he feels bad because he stole so many things from this house.

When Pip arrives there, he sees a man hiding on the marshes. Despite be wearing the same clothes as the man from the last night, and have the same iron leg, he is not the same person. He is another convict who, in their last meeting was hiding in the woods. The man sees Pip, hit him and then flees.

"And yet this man was dressed in coarse grey, too, and had a great iron on his leg, and was lame, and hoarse, and cold, and was everything that the other man was; except that he had not the same face, and had a flat broad-brimmed low-crowned felt that on"

After that, Pip sees in the distance his terrible fellow, the legitime, limping and waiting for him. The man seems to be cold, wet and starving. Pip gives him the file and all the food. For a moment the man seemed to be gentle with Pip, but when Pip mentions the other convict he encountered in the marshes, the man becomes violent and threatening again.

"He held me by the collar and stared at me so, that I began to think his first idea about cutting my throat had revived."

Meanwhile, Pip leaves the Battery and the man starts trying to unleash the iron leg with the file.

See you in Chapter four.

Great Expectations - Charles Dickens - Chapter two

The second chapter is basically an introduction to the character of Mrs Gargery, her husband Joe and the relations among them.

Pip describes his sister, Mrs Gargery as being twenty years older than him. She is not a good-looking woman, with black hair and eyes and a "prevailing redness of skin that I sometimes used to wonder whether it was possible she washed herself with a nutmeg-grater instead of soap". Also, he describes Joe Gargery as a fair man with curls of flaxen hair on side of his smooth face, and being "a mild, good-natured, sweet-tempered, easy-going, foolish, dear fellow - a sort of Hercules in strength, and also in weakness".

Mrs Gargery and Joe Gargery

When Dickens uses the term "by hand" to write about how Mrs Gargery raised Pip, he is intentionally ambiguous. Originally, 'by hand' meant be nursed by someone other than ones biological mother (maybe by bottle). On the other hand, writing 'by hand' evokes using her hand corporally against her husband and kids. 

"Having at that time to find out for myself what the expression meant, and knowing her to have a hard and heavy hand, and to be much in the habit of laying it upon her husband as well as upon me, I supposed that Joe Gargery and I were both brought up by hand".

After running away from the church, Pip arrives at home and meet Joe waiting for him at the kitchen. Joe warns him that his sister and "Tickler" (a wax-ended piece of cane) were looking for him for a while and that she was furious with his absence. 

"Tickler" in action with Mrs Gargery

The only thing crossing Pip's mind was his obligation to "the man with an iron leg". Trying to accomplish his task, Pip stirs a piece of bread at that night, and early in the morning Pip goes to the kitchen and steals "some bread, some rind of cheese, about half a jar of mincemeat (which I tied up in my pocket-handkerchief with my last night's slice), some brandy from a stone bottle...... , a meat bone with very little on it, and a beautiful round compact pork pie". Also, Pip steals a file (knife) from Joe's stuff.

After that, Pip runs to the marshes to meet the mysterious man with the "iron leg".

See you in Chapter three!

Great Expectations - Charles Dickens - Chapter one

Chapter One

The first chapter is an introduction to the main character, Philip Pirrip, or as he used to call himself, only Pip. He never knew his parents, and the only likeness that he had about them, came from his imagination looking at their tombstones. 

Pip had imagined his father as a "square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair" and his mother "freckled and sickly". In that hard days, Pip had five brothers who died as well. Now, they rest beside the tomb of their parents.

Pip lives with his sister in the marsh country in south-east England. One night, Pip was at the village churchyard when one man arrives. The young boy describes him as a "fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied round his head" 

This man seized and turned him upside down, searching for something in Pip's pockets, but the only thing that he had was a piece of bread. Inquired by the man about the purpose of his presence there, Pip says that he was only gazing his parent's graves and that he lives a mile from the church.

A photo of the Kent graveyard on which Dickens based his description.

So, the man demands Pip to bring a file (knife) and a wittle(a mispronunciation for victuals or vittle - which means food) in the next day morning in order to let him alive.

Actually, he was an escape convicted man and the "iron leg" that Pip refers is some kind of a ball in a chain with a leg cuff.

Pip runs through the marshes heading his home and for a while stops to see if the man was still there, and he was, limping and looking at him. Pip was so frightened that he started to run again, but this time without stopping. 

See you in Chapter two!

Wuthering Heights - Review

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë was first published in December 1847. Ever since then, many editions of this masterpiece of English literature has been released. In the isolated English moors, this gripping romance with its flawless narrative will hook you from the very first page.

Wandering the streets of Liverpool, a gipsy boy called Heathcliff is found by Mr Earnshaw, an English Landlord. Deciding to adopt the boy, and bringing him to live at Wuthering Heights, Mr Earnshaw could never have imagined that he would be starting a ruthless, passionate story of love and revenge.

Catherine, Mr Earnshaw daughter, starts a close relationship with Heathcliff, arousing the fury of her brother Hindley Earnshaw. After the death of his father, he starts to managing Wuthering Heights and to mistreat Heathcliff, forcing him to work hard and revoking his education access.

A man called Mr Lockwood rents Thrushcross Grange, a manor house owned by Mr Heathcliff. He meets Nelly Dean, a housekeeper who grew up closer to Hindley and Catherine. Trying to answer all the questions raised by the new tenant, Nelly Dean starts to narrate the story of Heathcliff and the residents of Wuthering Heights.

Written in such richness of details, Wuthering Heights caught my attention and provoked my feelings. I could fell the atmosphere of the moors. I could imagine the characters as well as their countenance. On the other hand, this meticulous description can bore the reader who is not used with the method. Another relevant point is, to have been written in the 18ths, Bronte writes using a fancy and not usual vocabulary for the present day.

Finally, I strongly recommend this book for everyone who feels the need for extending their vocabulary, mainly English students, while reading a wonderful and unique novel.

See you.

Keys to Power - Law 31

Words like "freedom," "options," and "choice" evoke a power of possibility far beyond the reality of the benefits they entail ( to make something necessary, or to involve something ). When examined closely, the choices we have - in the marketplace, in elections, in our jobs - tend to have noticed limitations: They are often a matter of a choice simply between A and B, with the rest of the alphabet out of the picture. Yet as long as the faintest mirage of choice flickers on, we rarely focus on the missing options. We "choose" to believe that the game is far, and that we have our freedom. We prefer not to think too much about the depth or our liberty to choose.

This unwillingness ( The quality or state of being unwilling to do something; reluctance ) to probe the smallness of our choices stems from the fact that too much freedom creates a kind of anxiety. The phrase "unlimited options" sounds infinitely promising, but unlimited options would actually paralyze us and cloud our ability to choose. Our limited range of choices comfort us.

FROM THE 48 LAWS OF POWER - ROBERT GREENE