There is something to be said for the last hypothesis, if we accept the
interpretation of many critics from Thomas Wright onwards-^ that Estella
is largely based on Ellen Ternan, the young actress whom the middle-aged
Dickens had fallen in love with. So little is known about the character
of Ellen Ternan, that we can never be sure about this, but Estella is certainly
far more sexually alive than any of her predecessorsand so is Pip, when nis
desire gets the better of him.
Somehow, the following passionate declaration does not quite sound like
that of an innocent young man in his first love-affair, but that of an
experienced but diffident grown-up afraid to push his luck too far and
yet impatient to find satisfaction:
Then, a burst of gratitude came upon me, that she
should be destined for me, once the blacksmith's
boy. Then, I thought if she were, as I feared, by
no means rapturously grateful for that destiny yet,
when would she begin to be interested in me When
should I awaken the heart within her, that was mute
and sleeping now (XXIX,230).
This repeated excitement about Estel la's 'awakening' seems much more applicable
to Dickens than to Pip. It is clear from Biddy's case that the loyal, self-
sacrificing sister-figure'no longer offers any sexual attraction, but she still
offers security and thus it siiould not surprise us that Dickens attempts to
fuse the two, though it is not such a happy inspiration within the context
of the novel
The very ending is beautifully ambiguous: both Pip and Estella have been
toned down by suffering, and a mist envelops them as they walk away, hand in hand.
Perhaps it is a bit pessimistic to say that the ending suggests 'an afterworld
without colour, sound, or warmth, a world of pale companionship, sad serenity,
and of disembodied contemplation of life by those who have left it for ever'
but indeed our hero and heroine are too subdued ever to find ecstatic
f
happiness
In the final analysis, it does not seem to make any difference that Estella
is Magwitch's daughter. She may never know, and Pip no longer cares. Yet,
apart from the irony about the source of Pip's great expectations, it underlines
most powerfully how even 'innocent' people are implicated in crime, quite
unknowingly. Apart from Biddy, there is not a single person that is nog involved
in legal or moral crime, or at least feels guilty about having failed to do
good. Dickens seems to suggest that it cannot be any other way in a society
that isolates the individual (a kind of self-protection against extent cruelty
and crime) and yet expects it to be social.
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