Importance of Class System in Great Expectations, and North and South - Essay Example

Client’s Information In the novels Great Expectations and North and South, the issues are central to the themes of the plot developments. In Great Expectations, Charles Dickens creates a character rich study that represents the absurdity and monstrosity that Dickens has observed in his life. In North and South, the character of Margaret is the symbol of virtue and humility. She is elegant and beautiful which denotes the quality of her nature, without having been born to privilege. As these two novels navigate the social morays of their times and make commentary on class in comparison to quality of character, the novels create intelligently woven tales that are rich in story and plot, while maintaining a relevant editorial on the socioeconomic relationships within their culture. In Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, the main character, Pip, experiences the many levels of the class system in nineteenth century England. Although such a rise would be near impossible, the use of one character to experience the many levels of the system allows the reader to create a structure and relativity between the lowest place where he starts his journey, to the higher end where he ends as an English gentleman. Although Dickens allows his character to have this journey, “The atmosphere and smell of the graveyard, . . . remains with Pip, whether he is an apprentice blacksmith, in Miss 1 Client’s Last Name 2 Havesham’s employ, or partaking of gentlemanly delights in London.” [1]. The reader remains aware of the rise that Pip has experienced and, when read during the time period, a personal impact was undoubtedly felt by this commentary. In exploring the class system in Great Expectations, Dickens is able to establish the importance of the system to the social culture, while making clear commentary on the true equality of the classes. As he develops his characters, we see that true worth is not measured in wealth or distinction, but rather in the quality of the character of an individual. Miss Havesham, a woman of means, is a twisted character who seeks to avenge herself on a boy and influence the growth and ability to form a good relationship by twisting the mind of a girl. In the bitterness of her ruined life, she seeks revenge through those who should have hope by virtue of their youth. Dickens displays an immense fascination with the prison system in his work. The character of Magwitch is quietly central to the theme of class distinction within the work. “As a returned convict who was been forcibly expelled, Magwitch in Great Expectations occupies a more complex position than mere ‘out sidedness’ and becomes a tool for a critique of contemporary British society.” [2] In the use of this character, Dickens is able to convey some responsibility on society for the misfortunes of this assigned to the prison system, while creating a man who can also be seen as a criminal. “He is both insider and 1. O. R. Dathorne. Worlds Apart: Race in the Modern Period. Westport, Conn: Bergin & Garvey, 2001, pp 172. 2. Grace Moore. Dickens and Empire: Discourses of Class, Race and Colonialims in the Works of Charles Dickens. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004, pp 15. 3. Moore, pp15. 2 Client’s Last Name 3 exile; one who has been abused by the social system and who as a result, has come to abuse that system.”[3] It is important for his point that Magwitch succeed in his goals. This makes the statement that being a criminal should not be the final definition of a man. A fascinating parallel has been drawn between Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, and Great Expectations. Jerome Meckier, in his book Dickens Great Expectations: Misnars Pavilion Versus Cinderella suggests that there are many pairs of monster and creation within the novel. Miss Havesham and Estella, Magwitch and Pip, and many other relationships throughout the bible mimic Shelley’s monster relationship within her novel. Although, “Dickens multiplies parallels to Frankenstein and his creature; the more variations he introduces the more limited Shelley is made to appear.” [4]. As Dickens creates a story of complexity in character, this mirroring of a classic horrific relationship reinforces his commentary on the developed social system. Meckier goes on to explain the Cinderella parallel and how it has taken on the form of monstrosity. Pip is given a Cinderella like existence as his life starts at a very humble means and is elevated to a place of status. “Great Expectations is crammed with monsters and monster-makers, because, to Dickens’ horror, monstrosity has become the social norm.” The attitude of the upper class has become a source of horror for Dickens and he takes this opportunity within his story to show the darkness that he perceives in the social class system. “Tragicomic developments from Cinderella-like expectations, developments seldom unrelated to the snobbery and desire for revenge born of 4. Jerome Meckier. Dickens Great Expectations: Misnars Pavilion Versus Cinderella. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2002, pp159. 3 Client’s Last Name 4 socioeconomic inequalities - that, said Dickens, is what monstrosity really is.”[5] This nature of monstrosity is the core message the Dickens has for his reader. That social class is not indicative of quality and that monstrosity is as it is - monstrous. Dickens lives in a world that has been influenced by the industrial revolution and it is indicated by the way in which his characters are wealthy by means of commerce and industry. Even Miss Havesham has her wealth, not by aristocracy, but by virtue of a family business that has left her wealthy. Elizabeth Gaskell, in her novel North and South, is also influenced by the industrial revolution. “The industrial revolution in England had had the effect of unsettling class structures which had shaped English life for centuries.” [6] In the way that this nineteenth century was dealing with a new social situation that allowed some mobility within the classes - limited though it was, both of these novels took their inspiration by this new order. Gaskell uses geography to indicate the separation of the past to the future. England’s past economic and social structure had been based on agriculture and “power was largely in the hands of the landowning aristocracy.” With this geographical divisioin, the economic development of the period could be clearly defined. “The south thus came to represent the past, where landowners inherited the right to gather rents from farmers and peasants along with a certain responsibility for their welfare.” This would be left over from feudalism that had died out as commerce had led the way toward the new economy. “The north claimed to be the future; its leaders were the middle-class 5. Meckier, pp 159. 6. Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell. North and South. Wordsworth Edns, 1993, pp vi. 4 Client’s Last Name 5 entrepreneurs - ’self-made men’ - who accumulated capitol by shrewd calculation based on the ‘laws’ of supply and demand.” [7] A way in which Gaskell uses the dichotomy of class versus quality is the way in which she uses the symbol of the Indian shawl in order to convey the difference between Margaret’s beauty and Edith’s less fortunate stature. While Margaret is not the cousin of wealth and status, she does carry a beauty that Edith cannot ever attain. In this way, the idea that money and class distinction does not create the true status of an individual is cleverly crafted. As Marjorie Garson points out in her book, Moral Taste: Aesthetics, Subjectivity and Social Power in the Nineteenth-Century Novel, “Under the shawls, she wears ‘a black silk dress’ donned, we are told, ‘in mourning for some distant relative of her father’s’.” Garson talks about the use of the plain simple dress to show off the beauty that Margaret carries, without making her vain or aware of her beauty. She is made to try on the shawls, and this provides the device for the author to discuss the beauty that she holds.[8]. With this classic version of a heroine, unassuming and demure, Gaskell creates the kind of female we wish was part of the upper class, as opposed to the one who actually is in that class. This idea that, because she is naturally beautiful and has no assuming characteristics, she deserves the status of class and the privilege of wealth. This comparison of character as it relates to the actual attaining of status and wealth is echoed 7. Gaskell, pp vi. 8. Marjorie Garson. Moral Taste: Aesthetics, Subjectivity and Social Power in the Nineteenth-Century Novel. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007, 291. 5 Client’s Last Name 6 in the Dickens novel as he developed, as well, characters that were more deserving of privilege than those who were already of the status. “Margaret deserves to be offered material goods precisely because she does not covet them.”, Garson says of the nature of her character [9]. Margaret’s character, too, can be compared to Cinderella. She rises in class through marriage and becomes the refined woman that was her natural state and her social potential. Garson says, “Good taste serves as a signal by which chosen spirits recognize one another, but it cannot redeem those who do not recognize it when they see it.” [10] The forces in Margaret’s life that are negative, in the end, are actually without merit and can be dismissed. Her life is designed to succeed by her grace and good taste, and those who do not understand her natural right to these things, according to the structure of the plot, are ultimately without importance. One of the differences that is presented between the novels is the way in which class is represented. Class is represented monetarily for Dickens. He doesn’t speak much about the materialistic nature of wealth, and in fact, his most wealthy character, Miss Havesham, lives in a house of decay. Material wealth, however, is the representing factor in North and South. Gaskell uses the luxury or lack of luxury as the symbols of status and wealth in her novel. The Indian shawls, the wallpaper in Margaret’s room, and the tactile descriptions that are made for these items are the signs of what is most desirous. It is the pleasure of wealth that affects the senses that is the main concept in her novel. 9. Garson, pp 294. 10. Garson, pp 309. 6 Client’s Last Name 7 Dickens and Gaskell each wrote about the class distinctions of their time period and how their characters overcame those distinctions to elevate their status. Pip was a creation of Miss Havesham and Magwitch. He was a leaf in the whirlwind of the agenda’s of others. In the first paragraph of the novel, he has the most control he would have over his life. “So I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.“ [11]. As he rose in status, he was used, thus making the comparison to Frankenstein’s monster a natural analogy. Margaret was deserving of a higher status by the nature of her beauty and virtue. The commentary of both books was a product of the industrial revolution of the late eighteenth century that had reorganized the way in which the class system was navigated. In both novels, the characters relate the way in which the class system was not based on true quality, but on the circumstance of luck and of manipulation. Wealth and status are not always given to the worthy - at least not until the end of the novel. 11. Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. London: Longmans, Green, 1958, pp 2. 7 Client’s Last Name 8 Works Cited Dathorne, O. R. Worlds Apart: Race in the Modern Period. Westport, Conn: Bergin & Garvey, 2001. Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. London: Longmans, Green, 1958. Garson, Marjorie. Moral Taste: Aesthetics, Subjectivity and Social Power in the Nineteenth-Century Novel. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007. Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn. North and South. Wordsworth Edns, 1993. Meckier, Jerome. Dickens Great Expectations: Misnars Pavilion Versus Cinderella. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2002. Moore, Grace. Dickens and Empire: Discourses of Class, Race and Colonialism in the Works of Charles Dickens. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004. 8 Read More