The Pickwick Club discussion

This is for week 2/09-2/15

Shmoop's Ch. 18 summary:

Pip has been apprenticing for four years when, one Saturday night at the Three Jolly Bargemen, something happens.

Pip and the boys are sitting around the fire listening to Mr. Wopsle give a dramatic reading about a recent murder when a mysterious man butts in and asks the group who they believe to be the murderer.

After some very lawyerly cross-examination, the man says that he wants to speak with a blacksmith named Joe Gargery and his apprentice, Pip. Whaaaa?

Pip, Joe, and the strange man walk home, where we find out that Mr. Mystery #2 is Mr. Jaggers, a London lawyer, who has come to tell Pip about his "great expectations."

He's about to inherit a huge fortune and will be made into a London gentleman!!!

Mr. Jaggers offers Joe money to compensate for losing an apprentice, but he refuses—and he's not too happy about being offered it, either.

Pip's benefactor will remain unknown to him until he/she chooses to reveal himself/herself, but in the meantime, Pip needs an education. How about Mr. Matthew Pocket, Miss Havisham's estranged relative, as a potential tutor?

Pip accepts.

Pip and Joe are speechless throughout this entire encounter.
Mr. Jaggers gives Pip twenty pounds to buy new clothes, offers Joe money again, gets rejected—quite violently—again, and then heads off.

Everyone is kind of blown away by this whole thing, but they try
to be happy for Pip.

In bed, he overhears Joe and Biddy saying nice things about him, and, for some reason, he's lonelier than he's ever been before in his entire life.

Shmoop's Ch. 19 summary:

Pip feels better in the morning. He can't wait to get to London—and then come home and show off his new fancy gentlemanly self to the village.

In a moving moment, Pip tells Joe he'll never forget him, but it feels a little contrived and insincere.

Things go downhill, when Pip and Biddy get in a fight after Pip asks Biddy to teach Joe everything she knows so that he might be worthy of his society.

Biddy tells Pip Joe is proud and that he might not want to be improved.

You're just jealous, Pip says, and how Biddy keeps from slapping him we do not know.

Pip gets himself all dressed up and decked out, and then visits Miss Havisham who already knows his situation. (Pip obviously thinks that this mysterious benefactor is Miss Havisham.) She flaunts him in front of Sarah Pocket to heat her jealousy.

That night, Pip has wild anxiety dreams, but he holds it together until he's in the carriage—and then he starts crying. Hard.

One of my favorite story-lines in GE is Pip's pursuit of becoming a gentleman. I have always been intrigued by the idea of "the gentleman". It seems to consist of several aspects including wealth, education, and manners. Does it seem to you that almost all Victorian literature derides the concept? Perhaps, we will see how Dickens feels about the idea as we move along.

Mr. Jaggers is an interesting character. He showed his debate skills at the Three Jolly Bargemen. What do you think of Pip's move to London? Do you think things will work out for him? Do you think he is being disloyal to Joe?