Miss Havisham

Miss Havisham is a pivotal character in the Charles Dickens novel, Great Expectations (1861).

Related Topics:
Charles Dickens - Novel - Great Expectations - 1861

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Miss Havisham's mother died when she was just a baby, and her father spoiled her as a result. When he died, he left her most of his money.

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As an adult, she fell in love with a man named Compeyson, who was only out to swindle her of her riches. Her cousin warned her to be careful, but she was too much in love to listen. At twenty minutes to nine on their wedding day, Havisham recieved a letter from Compeyson and realized that he had frauded her.

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Humiliated and heartbroken, Havisham had all the clocks stopped at the exact point in which she had learned of her betrayal. From that day on, she remained by herself in her decaying mansion the Satis House, never removing her wedding dress and only allowing a few people to see her.

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Miss Havisham later had her lawyer, Mr. Jaggers, adopt a daughter for her.

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:"I had been shut up in these rooms a long time (I don't know how long; you know what time the clocks keep here), when I told him that I wanted a little girl to rear and love, and save from my fate. I had first seen him when I sent for him to lay this place waste for me; having read of him in the newspapers, before I and the world parted. He told me that he would look about him for such an orphan child. One night he brought her here asleep, and I called her Estella."

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While helping Estella from ever suffering like she had was Miss Havisham's original goal, it changed when Estella grew older.

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:"Believe this: when she first came to me, I meant to save her from misery like my own. At first I meant no more. But as she grew, and promised to be very beautiful, I gradually did worse, and with my praises, and with my jewels, and with my teachings, and with this figure of myself always before her a warning to back and point my lessons, I stole her heart away and put ice in its place."

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Miss Havisham's and Estella's interaction with Pip, the protagonist of the story, a poor working-class boy called by Miss Havisham to her estate to entertain her, forms one of the central threads of the plot.

Related Topics:
Pip - Working-class - Boy - Plot

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Havisham is redeemed at the end of the novel when she realizes that she has caused Pip?s heart to be broken in the same manner as her own; rather than achieving any kind of personal revenge, she has only caused more pain. Miss Havisham begs Pip for forgiveness.

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:"Until you spoke to the other day, and until I saw in you a looking-glass that showed me what I once felt myself, I did not know what I had done. What have I done! What have I done!" What have I done! What have I done!"

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After Pip leaves, Miss Havisham's dress catches on fire from her fireplace. Pip rushes back in and saves her, but she ultimately lapses into a coma.

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Miss Havisham is a contradictory character in literature and in the context of her time. Unlike most unmarried women of the era, her wealth gives her tremendous power, which she uses to coax others to do her bidding and to advance her aims, yet she allows her disappointment at being jilted to ruin her life, thus giving the man who spurned her ultimate power over her. She lays waste to her estate, symbolic of herself, and tries to spread her cynicism and malaise to everyone she touches.

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