In Dickens' novel, Great Expectations, there are several circumstances when illusions are mistaken for realities. The appearance of specific things is often unfavourable to the conclusions of characters when the actuality of a situation is exposed. These illusions are exposed through Pip, a lower class youngster caught in the struggle of the social classes of 19th century England. Throughout the book, Dickens emphasizes the distinction between appearance and reality through Pip's expectations of something better, social status, and settings in the book. .
The most significant illusion in Great Expectations is Pip's confident expectations of a better days to come. Pip began out poor, and was sent for to spend time every week with an upper-middle-class crazy woman and her unkind adopted daughter, Estella. From the moment Pip met Estella, he fell in love with her. Later on in the novel, he was offered financial support from an anonymous .
patron that was to be consumed to go to London and become a gentleman. Pip assumed that Ms. Havisham, Estella's adoptive mother, was the benefactress. "My dream was out; my wild fancy was surpassed by sober reality; Miss Havisham was going to make my fortune on a grand scale." thought Pip.This was the illusion that Pip had created and converted into reality for himself. Because he believed that Ms. Havisham was his benefactress, Pip also expected that Estella was destined for him. "I was painting brilliant pictures of her plans for me. She had adopted Estella, and had as good as adopted me, and it could not fail to be her intention to bring us together." "She reserved it for me to restore the desolate house, admit the sunshine into the dark rooms, set the clocks a-going and the cold hearths a-blazing, tear down the cobwebs, destroy the vermin, -- in short, do all the shining deeds of the young knight of romance, and marry the princess. I had made up a rich attractive mystery, of which I was the hero.