Love
Great Expectations – The Guardian’s Influence
(867 words)
In this essay, I will show how Miss Havisham’s influence affects her adopted daughter, Estella, and how this influence shapes Estella’s attitudes towards love and men. Since Miss Havisham was betrayed on her wedding day, she has developed a deep contempt for men. By adopting a young girl called Estella, she attempts to instil in her a similar distrust of men and encourages her to take revenge on them. As a result, Estella grows up to be cold and cruel. However, as Estella becomes older, she begins to show indifference towards Miss Havisham’s destructive ways and starts to recognise the negative influence she has had on her life.
Miss Havisham also influences Pip, the protagonist and narrator of Great Expectations, by arranging for him to visit her house. Pip sets off to Miss Havisham’s house, where it becomes clear that Miss Havisham’s plan is to encourage Estella to entrap Pip and make him fall in love with her. Pip enters Miss Havisham’s house through dark passages where only candles light the way. Estella leads him by candlelight to the room where Miss Havisham sits. Pip finally sees Miss Havisham in an armchair, with one elbow resting on the table and her head leaning on her hand. He describes her as the “strangest lady I have ever seen”. This gives the reader an immediate image of a reclusive woman who is trapped in the past.
There has been no change to the decaying house, which is repeatedly presented as dark and neglected. Miss Havisham’s weathered wedding dress is still on display, preserved from the day she was jilted at the altar. The deterioration surrounding Miss Havisham has been there for Estella to see and live amongst, symbolising Miss Havisham’s inability to move on from her past. It also characterises her relationship not only with Estella but with humanity as a whole, particularly with men. The decaying environment reflects the destructive effect of Miss Havisham’s bitterness.
The reader can imagine Estella being brought up in an environment where Miss Havisham has shut herself away from the outside world. This has an obvious effect not only on the bitter and reclusive Miss Havisham but also on the young and impressionable Estella. Miss Havisham has not taught Estella what love is or how to love another person. Instead, she teaches her to use her beauty and attractiveness to manipulate men. Dickens therefore presents Estella as a product of her upbringing.
Miss Havisham influences Pip by deliberately encouraging him to fall in love with Estella. She repeatedly tells him, “Love her, love her, love her!” The repetition emphasises the strength of Miss Havisham’s desire for revenge. She takes pleasure in Pip’s suffering and wants him to continue loving Estella regardless of how cruelly Estella treats him. Miss Havisham is therefore using Pip as part of her revenge against men, even though Pip himself has done nothing to deserve her hatred.
Miss Havisham treats Estella as though she is responsible for carrying on the bitterness that Miss Havisham developed when she was younger. However, after Estella has been away from Miss Havisham, she seems to have developed a greater awareness of the influence that Miss Havisham has had on her. As a young child, Estella appears to accept Miss Havisham’s views without questioning them. The reader understands that Estella has been taught to believe that men are objects to be controlled and hurt. Miss Havisham adopted Estella and brought her up, so Estella has a sense of respect and loyalty towards her. However, as Estella becomes older, she begins to express her own feelings and challenge Miss Havisham.
Miss Havisham cruelly treated Estella when she was a child, giving her an upbringing characterised by psychological manipulation and emotional abuse. Estella has been taught how to attract men while simultaneously being encouraged to despise them. This creates a contradiction in her character: she has the ability to make men fall in love with her, but she has not been taught how to experience genuine love herself. Dickens therefore suggests that Miss Havisham’s attempt to use Estella as an instrument of revenge has caused lasting emotional damage.
Miss Havisham eventually confronts Estella about her cold and distant behaviour. However, Miss Havisham seems to blame Estella for qualities that she herself has encouraged. She reproaches Estella by exclaiming, “You cold, cold heart!” Estella responds by asking, “do you reproach me for being cold?” This rhetorical question exposes the hypocrisy of Miss Havisham’s criticism. How can Miss Havisham be angry with Estella for being cold when she is the person who raised her to behave in this way?
Miss Havisham’s influence has been to make Estella follow her beliefs and listen to her advice. However, now that Estella has grown older and has left home, she begins to resist Miss Havisham’s control. Miss Havisham resents Estella for developing feelings and opinions that challenge the way she was brought up. Dickens makes it clear that Estella’s behaviour is not entirely her own making. She has been shaped by Miss Havisham’s bitterness, manipulation and desire for revenge. Through Estella, Dickens demonstrates how damaging it can be when a child is raised to inherit another person’s hatred and emotional pain.
An admiration of ‘Children’ by Vicki Feaver
(819 words)
In this essay, I will explore how effectively Vicki Feaver, a female poet, conveys the influence of not only a mother but potentially all mothers. The poem presents the relationship between a loving parent and her child, exploring a mother’s desire to provide her child with an upbringing filled with love, care and ambition.
The first two tercets convey the image of a woman who, whether through careless accident or careful planning, believes that her child has been brought into this world to be loved. Feaver uses the pronoun ‘we’ to encompass mothers collectively, while also making the experience feel personal and intimate. The mother is present ‘where they began’, suggesting that the bond between mother and child begins from the moment of birth. The description of the children as ‘red mewling strangers’ acknowledges the unfamiliarity of a newborn while also conveying the child’s vulnerable appearance and persistent crying. Feaver develops this idea further with the phrase ‘they tear our threshold’, suggesting that the arrival of a child dramatically changes the mother’s life. The verb ‘tear’ conveys the magnitude and intensity of the disruption caused by a newborn. However, Feaver balances this sense of disruption with the tenderness of ‘immediately we love them’. The adverb ‘immediately’ emphasises how quickly and instinctively a mother’s love develops, presenting motherhood as a powerful and unconditional emotion.
The next three tercets explore the mother’s love as the child begins to grow. Feaver refers to other people commenting on the newborn, which conveys the genuine pride a mother may feel: ‘we smile and blush’. The verbs ‘smile’ and ‘blush’ suggest happiness, affection and perhaps even embarrassment at the attention given to the child. However, motherhood is not presented as entirely joyful, as the mother must also respond to the baby’s ‘cries’. Despite this, the child’s pain becomes the mother’s pain, demonstrating the depth of parental sympathy and compassion. The child’s emotions appear to become the mother’s emotions, suggesting that the mother becomes almost entirely responsive to the needs of her child. This is also demonstrated through the phrase ‘and hold them tightly’, which conveys both physical affection and emotional protection. The mother’s attachment becomes so strong that she experiences the child as ‘a lost part of ourselves’. This could suggest that having a child allows the mother to rediscover a powerful and innocent form of love that she may have lost during her own life. The phrase also implies that the child becomes an important part of the mother’s identity, reinforcing the strength of their emotional connection.
In the final five tercets, Feaver reflects on the mother’s influence while also encouraging her to consider her own life. The arrival of a new life creates the possibility that the child may achieve more than the mother herself. This is evident in the mother’s desire to give her child ‘all the things we never had’. The phrase suggests that the mother is conscious of the disappointments and limitations in her own life and wants to prevent her child from experiencing the same difficulties. She recognises the potential pitfalls of life and attempts to protect her child from them, shown through the image of walking ‘in front of them with warning flags’. The metaphor of ‘warning flags’ suggests that the mother wants to identify dangers before the child encounters them, demonstrating her protective nature.
Feaver also explores the mother’s regrets through the statement ‘we who have failed to be authors of our lives write theirs’. The metaphor of being ‘authors’ suggests that people should have control over the direction of their own lives. However, the mothers feel that they have ‘failed’ to achieve this, so they attempt to shape and influence their children’s lives instead. This reveals both the love and potential limitations of parental influence. In wanting ‘to make heroes of them’, mothers are not content simply to protect their children; they also want them to achieve greatness and fulfil the ambitions that they themselves may not have achieved. The final image of mothers who ‘wait and watch like gardeners for flowers’ presents motherhood as patient and nurturing. The metaphor of ‘gardeners’ suggests that mothers provide care and support while waiting for their children to develop and flourish. Like flowers, the children have the potential to grow into something beautiful and admired.
Overall, Feaver’s poem portrays many powerful ideas about a mother’s influence over her child. From the moment of birth, a mother’s love affects the way she views herself, her child and the future. The poem suggests that mothers influence their children in subtle but meaningful ways, wanting to protect them from their own mistakes while also encouraging them to achieve their ambitions. Ultimately, Feaver presents motherhood as a relationship characterised by unconditional love, protection, sacrifice and hope. The mother’s desire for her child to have the best possible life demonstrates the enduring love and affection that can exist between a mother and her child.
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