In an article written by Christopher D. Morris, the actions and moral bad faith that the central character, Pip, exhibits are examined. In the profound novel, Great Expectations, written by Charles Dickens, the main character "Pip" is put through many tests that examine the type of man Pip strives to be and the type of man Pip really is. Pip's relationships with two central characters, Tom and Magwitch, are examined closely in this essay, and through these relationships, Pip's character is visible. Great Expectations is, in a sense, a Cinderella story in which Pip's fairy godmother turns out to be a convict running from the law. This "amulet" gives Pip a gift that changes Pip and his life.
In the beginning of the novel, Pip is a young boy that lives in an inhospitable home with his older sister and her husband. Although Pip's relationship with his sister is unkind, the relationship Pip develops with her husband is affable. Pip's brother-in-law, Joe, has taken Pip under his wing, and wants to take care of Pip. Critic Christopher Morris writes, "Pip claims to have developed a solicitude for Joe" in the opening of the novel, but later "that claim is everywhere contradicted by his actions." One example that Morris writes of to prove his point is, after Pip learns of the "selfless rational for Joe's acquiescence in Mrs. Joe's government", Pip writes:.
Young as I was, I believe that I dated a new admiration of Joe from that night. We were equals afterwards, as we has been before: but afterwards, at quiet times when I sat looking at Joe and thinking about him, I had a new sensation of feeling conscious that I was looking up to Joe in my heart.
(7, 52)3.
Morris points out the fact, that throughout the novel, this is the only time Pip will regard Joe as his equal. .
In chapter VIII, Pip is offered an invitation to a plantation where he meets two influential people in his life, Miss Havisham and her adopted daughter Estella.