Let's see here. Great Expectations was an interesting read. The characters and dialogue made for a bit of light hearted humor within a serious and, at times, dull storyline. I found that I couldn't really develop an attatchment to Pip after his character started changing because all I wanted was the old Pip back. This was probably what Dickens had intended which made the ending of the book somewhat satasfying. I did develope an attatchment to Joe and Miss Havisham. I think it would be hard not to become atleast alittle emotionally tied to Joe because he is such an innocent and childlike character. Miss Havisham, however, may seem like an unlikely character to like. To be completely honest I'm not too sure why i liked her so much. Maybe it was because her action, too, seemed rather childlike in the way that her whole reaction to being left on her wedding day was tantrum-like and just silly.
Dickens as a writer is very effective in what I think he was tryng to accomplish. I think his main goal in the book, in the sense of character development, was to start off Pip as a character that you immediately became attatched too that quickly changed and became less likeable as the story progressed. This made you want the old Pip back and, inturn, made the ending better when you, in a sense, got the old Pip back. Dickens, is obviously a very good writer. I dont think anyone can argue that. Even though i found this book tedious and boring for the most part, I did enjoy Dickens' writing style. The language itself was somewhat foriegn only because it was writen about 150 years ago, but once you got used to the general feel and flow of the words and language you could put more of our energy on the story than trying to decipher the language itself.
Even though the writing was good, that didn't make the actual novel enjoyable. Some parts were okay and at times even fun to read but for the most part I had a hard time sitting down and doing much more than looking at the words run down the page. I must confess that there were chapters that I simply could not force mysely to read. There were also those nights that either I was too busy or just not patient enough to bring myself to believe that all of the symbols on the page were actually supposed to mean something. Usually, I caught up the next night or a little bit everyday. I did find that Sparknotes was my savior for this book though. Even if I had read, I found that I might think back and not have the faintest clue as to what had just happened in the novel. So, yes, sparknotes helped me to just refresh and remember "Oh ya, I think I remember reading something about that."
I found that the best time for me to read was at night right around dinner time. This didn't always make my mom too happy but it worked for me. After dinner I was too tired to comprehend the words so I usually did something easy like math homework. Before dinner I was usually soaking wet and freezing, running outside in the wind a rain and at times hail for track. There were days of course that I couldn't bring myelf to read so i found myself at 6:00 AM at Alena's house the next morning frivilously reading and slapping down those annotations before we had to walk out in 35 degree weather to catch the bus. And then, of course, I ,at times, found myself sitting next to Jamison on the bus, both of us with our books and sticky notes out, trying to finish up the last few paragraphs of our assignment before having to trudge into class and spend yet another day discussing the never ending Great Expectations.
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