0:00:05 > 0:00:09"I took her hand in mine and we went out of the ruined place.
0:00:09 > 0:00:14"And, as the morning mists had risen long ago when I left the forge,
0:00:14 > 0:00:17"so the evening mists were rising now,
0:00:17 > 0:00:19"and in all the broad expanse of tranquil light
0:00:19 > 0:00:24"they showed to me, I saw no shadow of another parting from her."
0:00:25 > 0:00:30These are the final words of Charles Dickens' Great Expectations,
0:00:30 > 0:00:34in which the hero, Pip, is reunited with the love of his life, Estella.
0:00:34 > 0:00:38It's a moving ending to what is arguably his greatest work.
0:00:38 > 0:00:40But it almost never existed.
0:00:40 > 0:00:43This wasn't quite how Dickens had planned it.
0:00:43 > 0:00:45He originally wrote another finale,
0:00:45 > 0:00:49a bleak scene that saw his two characters part ways for ever.
0:00:49 > 0:00:53But he had second thoughts, scrapping the final pages
0:00:53 > 0:00:56and rewriting them, leaving the couple walking off,
0:00:56 > 0:00:59hand in hand, in the evening light.
0:00:59 > 0:01:02Some say that was a cop out, that Dickens was letting himself
0:01:02 > 0:01:06and the book down by simply dashing off a happy ending.
0:01:06 > 0:01:09But I think there's more to it than that.
0:01:09 > 0:01:12I'm a writer myself and I know that changing the end of a book is
0:01:12 > 0:01:15one of the most radical things any author can do.
0:01:15 > 0:01:19It's peculiar that Dickens would want to alter something
0:01:19 > 0:01:20so integral to the story.
0:01:22 > 0:01:26So, why did he make that decision? What inspired it?
0:01:26 > 0:01:29And what could it tell us about Dickens himself?
0:01:29 > 0:01:33To find out, I need to learn more about Dickens as a writer,
0:01:33 > 0:01:35who he wrote for and why.
0:01:35 > 0:01:39And I also need to understand how his own life fed into his work,
0:01:39 > 0:01:41how his difficult upbringing
0:01:41 > 0:01:45and troubled relationships both haunted and motivated him.
0:01:46 > 0:01:50Far from being just a few hurried scribblings at the end of a novel,
0:01:50 > 0:01:54I think this new ending gives a real insight into Dickens,
0:01:54 > 0:01:56both as an author and as a man.
0:02:15 > 0:02:18In the 15 years I spent as an EastEnders scriptwriter,
0:02:18 > 0:02:20my colleagues always told me that
0:02:20 > 0:02:25if Charles Dickens was alive today, he'd be doing exactly what I was -
0:02:25 > 0:02:29writing soaps. Maybe that's just how soap writers of today would like to
0:02:29 > 0:02:30think of themselves.
0:02:30 > 0:02:33After all, who wouldn't want to be mentioned in the same breath
0:02:33 > 0:02:36as Charles Dickens? There's some truth to it, though.
0:02:36 > 0:02:39Dickens serialised his novels weekly and monthly, and just
0:02:39 > 0:02:43like soap writers of today, he was a populist through and through.
0:02:43 > 0:02:47He wrote for a mass audience and they adored him for it.
0:02:47 > 0:02:50I'm not quite sure that I could have been the Dickens of his day.
0:02:50 > 0:02:52His output was prolific.
0:02:52 > 0:02:56He came up with 20 novels, hundreds of articles,
0:02:56 > 0:03:00and 989 named characters during his lifetime.
0:03:00 > 0:03:04But I've been fascinated with him since my EastEnders days.
0:03:04 > 0:03:07So much so that I'm writing a new series
0:03:07 > 0:03:09based on some of his characters.
0:03:09 > 0:03:12Kind of a soap opera set in Dickens' imaginary world.
0:03:12 > 0:03:15I think you can begin to understand something of Dickens
0:03:15 > 0:03:17just by reading his books.
0:03:17 > 0:03:20He gives us a glimpse of himself in all his work.
0:03:20 > 0:03:24But none are more revealing than this,
0:03:24 > 0:03:26in my opinion his best book, Great Expectations.
0:03:28 > 0:03:34Written in 1860 and 1861, a decade before Dickens' death,
0:03:34 > 0:03:37Great Expectations is widely regarded as one of the great
0:03:37 > 0:03:39novels in the English language.
0:03:41 > 0:03:44It boasts some of Dickens' most memorable scenes,
0:03:44 > 0:03:49not least the opening, set in a graveyard on the North Kent marshes.
0:03:51 > 0:03:55Here, a young orphan, Pip, is visiting his family's graves,
0:03:55 > 0:03:57a typically Dickensian scene setter,
0:03:57 > 0:04:01when he is accosted by an escaped convict, Magwitch.
0:04:01 > 0:04:06"A man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud,
0:04:06 > 0:04:09"and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and stung by nettles,
0:04:09 > 0:04:14"and torn by briars, who limped and shivered and glared and growled,
0:04:14 > 0:04:18"and whose teeth chattered in his head, as he seized me by the chin."
0:04:23 > 0:04:25It's a terrifying opening in some ways,
0:04:25 > 0:04:27with Magwitch threatening to kill Pip,
0:04:27 > 0:04:31but Dickens fills it with brilliant visual humour throughout,
0:04:31 > 0:04:34giving the scenes an offbeat, absurd quality.
0:04:36 > 0:04:39Dickens actually wanted Great Expectations to be a comedy
0:04:39 > 0:04:43and he called its opening pages "exceedingly droll".
0:04:43 > 0:04:48In chapter three, Pip, fresh from stealing a blacksmith's file for
0:04:48 > 0:04:52Magwitch to cut his shackles, runs into a herd of judgmental cattle.
0:04:53 > 0:04:56"One black ox with a white cravat on,
0:04:56 > 0:04:59"who even had, to my awakened conscience,
0:04:59 > 0:05:01"something of a clerical air, fixed me
0:05:01 > 0:05:03"so obstinately with his eyes
0:05:03 > 0:05:07"and moved his blunt head round in such an accusatory manner as
0:05:07 > 0:05:10"I moved round, that I blubbered out to him,
0:05:10 > 0:05:14" 'I couldn't help it, sir. It wasn't for myself I took it.' "
0:05:16 > 0:05:19Dickens always had an acute sense of the tragicomic.
0:05:19 > 0:05:23In Oliver Twist, he wrote that all good murderous melodramas
0:05:23 > 0:05:25were constructed like streaky bacon.
0:05:25 > 0:05:28The red and the white representing comedy and tragedy,
0:05:28 > 0:05:31fried up together, complementing each other,
0:05:31 > 0:05:34and this is precisely what he does here.
0:05:34 > 0:05:38For me, this is perfect writing. The ability to swerve between comedy
0:05:38 > 0:05:41and drama without it ever feeling unnatural.
0:05:41 > 0:05:44It's exactly what I've been trying to do for much of my life.
0:05:44 > 0:05:48It's the secret to good popular drama, but here it feels effortless.
0:05:51 > 0:05:53The Pip in the graveyard grows up
0:05:53 > 0:05:57and is gifted a huge amount of money by a mysterious benefactor.
0:05:58 > 0:06:02Ashamed of his family and humble upbringing, Pip moves here,
0:06:02 > 0:06:05to Central London, to become a gentleman, taking up
0:06:05 > 0:06:10a dandy-ish lifestyle of partying, drinking and spending money.
0:06:11 > 0:06:15He believes that his patron is the infamous Miss Havisham,
0:06:15 > 0:06:17the wealthy unhinged spinster,
0:06:17 > 0:06:21jilted at the altar many years ago and adopted mother of Estella.
0:06:23 > 0:06:26He's infatuated with the beautiful, aloof Estella
0:06:26 > 0:06:29and convinces himself that Miss Havisham is funding him,
0:06:29 > 0:06:33grooming him even, so that he and Estella will one day marry.
0:06:36 > 0:06:41But then comes Dickens' big plot twist, as he put it, "the very
0:06:41 > 0:06:46"fine, new and grotesque idea", upon which the whole story hinges.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49Pip's benefactor isn't Miss Havisham.
0:06:49 > 0:06:53It's Magwitch, the convict he helped as a youngster.
0:06:55 > 0:06:59Pip is devastated, realising that he left his home,
0:06:59 > 0:07:02the people he loves, on a false hope.
0:07:02 > 0:07:07Even worse, he knows that he was never meant for Estella.
0:07:07 > 0:07:09As a plot device, this works brilliantly.
0:07:09 > 0:07:12As the hero struggles to deal with the dashing
0:07:12 > 0:07:16of his great expectations, the book steps up a gear.
0:07:16 > 0:07:20More set pieces, more drama, as Dickens hikes up the tension,
0:07:20 > 0:07:22page after page.
0:07:26 > 0:07:29At the same time, there is a dramatic shift in tone.
0:07:29 > 0:07:33The book becomes darker and more melancholy.
0:07:33 > 0:07:38Pip berates himself for his decisions, his snobbery and pride.
0:07:40 > 0:07:42"I thought how miserable I was,
0:07:42 > 0:07:46"but hardly knew why or how long I had been so, or on what day
0:07:46 > 0:07:51"of the week I made the reflection, or even who I was that made it."
0:07:53 > 0:07:57He learns that Estella has married a violent, brutal man.
0:07:57 > 0:08:00Humbled, he leaves the country to become a lowly clerk.
0:08:00 > 0:08:04It's on his return, over a decade later, when he meets Estella
0:08:04 > 0:08:09again by chance, and we arrive at the ending that almost never was.
0:08:09 > 0:08:12This change in tone in the novel, this...darkening,
0:08:12 > 0:08:14really tells us a lot about Dickens.
0:08:14 > 0:08:17This was a man who set out to write a comedy,
0:08:17 > 0:08:21but ended up writing a moral drama that somehow veered into tragedy.
0:08:21 > 0:08:25To me, Great Expectations suggests an author caught between those
0:08:25 > 0:08:27two things,
0:08:27 > 0:08:30trying to tread a delicate path between the light and the shade.
0:08:36 > 0:08:39Here at the Wisbech and Fenland Museum in Cambridgeshire,
0:08:39 > 0:08:42we can get an even better glimpse into Dickens' mind.
0:08:42 > 0:08:46And into his struggles with the ending of the novel.
0:08:46 > 0:08:50- So, this is the original manuscript of Great Expectations.- Yes.
0:08:50 > 0:08:54Isn't it fantastic to work with the original like this?
0:08:54 > 0:08:57And we can see all of the changes that Dickens makes.
0:08:57 > 0:09:00And first thoughts and second thoughts.
0:09:00 > 0:09:02So you can actually see where he struggled,
0:09:02 > 0:09:04I guess, during the writing process.
0:09:04 > 0:09:07One of the surprising things we can see in this manuscript is that
0:09:07 > 0:09:10a couple of the comic scenes that we'd imagined just flowing
0:09:10 > 0:09:13out of Dickens so naturally, that's really what he's known for,
0:09:13 > 0:09:16that brilliant kind of fluid comic writing,
0:09:16 > 0:09:18he's actually worked those a bit.
0:09:18 > 0:09:22So if we have a look at this scene where Pip goes to school,
0:09:22 > 0:09:27it's this fantastic scene with Mr Wopsle's great aunt throwing
0:09:27 > 0:09:31- things at the naughty schoolchildren. - Oh, wow! He's really struggled here!
0:09:31 > 0:09:34Yeah, we've got quite a lot of amendment there.
0:09:34 > 0:09:38There's also a very interesting bit at the end.
0:09:38 > 0:09:42This is the manuscript that Dickens changes the most, at the very end.
0:09:42 > 0:09:46And we've got these two competing endings.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49So you see here, this cancelled out section.
0:09:49 > 0:09:54We get this start of an original ending which Dickens wrote
0:09:54 > 0:09:55that was very bleak.
0:09:55 > 0:09:59It features Pip and Estella meeting by accident,
0:09:59 > 0:10:02as Dickens puts it, in Piccadilly.
0:10:02 > 0:10:05Dickens's great friend, John Forster,
0:10:05 > 0:10:10kept a copy of the first ending, which he then produced
0:10:10 > 0:10:13with his biography of Dickens some years after Dickens died.
0:10:13 > 0:10:15And it says here, "The lady and I
0:10:15 > 0:10:18"looked sadly enough on one another," which would be Estella.
0:10:18 > 0:10:22And he goes on, "She gave me the assurance that suffering had
0:10:22 > 0:10:26"been stronger than Miss Havisham's teaching, and had given her
0:10:26 > 0:10:29"a heart to understand what MY heart used to be."
0:10:29 > 0:10:31That's quite grim.
0:10:31 > 0:10:35Yeah, Estella's also remarried, so in practical terms,
0:10:35 > 0:10:38there's no romantic future for her and Pip,
0:10:38 > 0:10:41it's a very definite closing of that possibility.
0:10:41 > 0:10:42Why do you think he changed it?
0:10:42 > 0:10:46Well, he went to a friend of his that weekend, and he didn't like it.
0:10:46 > 0:10:49He says to Dickens, we think,
0:10:49 > 0:10:51"This is too bleak, or this is too uncomfortable for your readers,"
0:10:51 > 0:10:57something along those lines, and Dickens agrees to rethink it.
0:10:57 > 0:11:01So the ending that we then have, Pip meets Estella in the garden
0:11:01 > 0:11:06of Satis House - the home that she's grown up in with Miss Havisham,
0:11:06 > 0:11:10and this very important location for him and her through their lives.
0:11:10 > 0:11:14It's a moonlight scene, the fogs are rising
0:11:14 > 0:11:17and then there's just the possibility
0:11:17 > 0:11:20that maybe there's a Pip/Estella future.
0:11:20 > 0:11:24"I took her hand in mine, we went out of the ruined place.
0:11:24 > 0:11:29"And in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me,
0:11:29 > 0:11:32"I saw no shadow of another parting from her."
0:11:32 > 0:11:34So that's a happy ending.
0:11:34 > 0:11:35Do you feel it's...?
0:11:35 > 0:11:37It feels more satisfying
0:11:37 > 0:11:41than going from the grimness of this chance meeting in Piccadilly
0:11:41 > 0:11:44to them actually reaching a conclusion.
0:11:44 > 0:11:46Yes.
0:11:46 > 0:11:51The "no shadow" still reads slightly ambiguously to me,
0:11:51 > 0:11:55and maybe more so if we look at the changes Dickens makes to get there.
0:11:55 > 0:11:59So in the manuscript here, it's slightly differently phrased,
0:11:59 > 0:12:03"The shadow of no parting from her but one."
0:12:03 > 0:12:06- Meaning death, I guess?- Yes.
0:12:06 > 0:12:10And there, instead of "no shadow of another parting",
0:12:10 > 0:12:14we've got this different wording - the shadow of NO parting.
0:12:14 > 0:12:18Dickens immediately decides to cut "but one",
0:12:18 > 0:12:21so we never get this "only in death".
0:12:21 > 0:12:24So he was really struggling with this ending, to get it right.
0:12:24 > 0:12:27Yeah, it's going through a number of quite substantial changes,
0:12:27 > 0:12:31I think, that he really changed the tone
0:12:31 > 0:12:35and perhaps the way we're invited to read these lines.
0:12:35 > 0:12:40I think it shows that it's something that he himself is...
0:12:40 > 0:12:42uncomfortable about, unsure about.
0:12:42 > 0:12:48It continues to bother him, even after the book is closed.
0:12:49 > 0:12:52Dickens' revised finale may not be a simple, happy ending,
0:12:52 > 0:12:56but it does offer some hope - a possible future for Pip and Estella.
0:12:56 > 0:13:01But why did Dickens, who was usually so decisive and forthright,
0:13:01 > 0:13:04decide to make such a massive change?
0:13:05 > 0:13:08I'm not sure I buy Dickens changing the end of this book simply
0:13:08 > 0:13:10because a friend suggested he do so.
0:13:10 > 0:13:12As writers, we agonise over things like this,
0:13:12 > 0:13:14and it's clear that's what Dickens is doing here.
0:13:14 > 0:13:17He keeps going back to it, changing the odd word,
0:13:17 > 0:13:20playing with the nuance of the language, trying to make it perfect,
0:13:20 > 0:13:23trying to get the balance right, tonally, between light and shade.
0:13:23 > 0:13:26But for a writer of Dickens' calibre to be this indecisive,
0:13:26 > 0:13:29something must be eating away at him.
0:13:29 > 0:13:31What is it?
0:13:35 > 0:13:38You can always discover something of an author by looking
0:13:38 > 0:13:42at their audience, by working out who they're writing for.
0:13:42 > 0:13:44The literary establishment at the time
0:13:44 > 0:13:46actually looked down on Dickens,
0:13:46 > 0:13:49but he was always more interested in what his readership,
0:13:49 > 0:13:52drawn from the middle and working classes, had to say.
0:13:54 > 0:13:56Any writer worth his salt will tell you,
0:13:56 > 0:13:58you need to understand your audience.
0:13:58 > 0:14:00When I'm writing, I feel the whole audience behind me,
0:14:00 > 0:14:03looking over my shoulder at the page.
0:14:03 > 0:14:05What I love about Dickens is he clearly understands that
0:14:05 > 0:14:07better than anyone else.
0:14:07 > 0:14:09He talks about his audience in personal terms,
0:14:09 > 0:14:11as if they were all sitting around a fire together,
0:14:11 > 0:14:13like they were friends.
0:14:14 > 0:14:16In 1853,
0:14:16 > 0:14:19a few years before the publication of Great Expectations, Dickens
0:14:19 > 0:14:24began to tour the country, reading his novels to packed audiences.
0:14:25 > 0:14:29This was a chance to get closer to his audience than ever before.
0:14:31 > 0:14:34There were tears, laughter, people fainted.
0:14:34 > 0:14:37He sold out huge venues, where people queued overnight,
0:14:37 > 0:14:40and tickets were touted at five times their face value.
0:14:40 > 0:14:43And remember, this isn't the Rolling Stones I'm talking about -
0:14:43 > 0:14:46this was Charles Dickens, the novelist.
0:14:47 > 0:14:50The audience who worshipped him on the stage
0:14:50 > 0:14:52were the same audience who bought his novels.
0:14:52 > 0:14:54Instead of publishing these novels in one volume,
0:14:54 > 0:14:57Dickens divided them into chunks and serialised them,
0:14:57 > 0:15:00weekly or monthly, in popular journals.
0:15:01 > 0:15:04It was a style pioneered by Dickens himself.
0:15:04 > 0:15:07By serialising the stories, he kept his audience waiting
0:15:07 > 0:15:09with bated breath for the next instalment.
0:15:09 > 0:15:13As his friend Wilkie Collins said, "Make 'em laugh, make 'em cry,
0:15:13 > 0:15:14"make 'em wait."
0:15:18 > 0:15:22In 1859, Dickens set up his own journal,
0:15:22 > 0:15:24based in this building in Covent Garden.
0:15:27 > 0:15:30These books contain all the original journals from 1860 and 1861,
0:15:30 > 0:15:35including Great Expectations as it was first serialised.
0:15:38 > 0:15:42This is the very first instalment, published in December 1860.
0:15:42 > 0:15:45Dickens actually had to rush publication of the novel
0:15:45 > 0:15:48because his journal all the year round was haemorrhaging readers,
0:15:48 > 0:15:52and he knew that a new novel from him would help boost sales.
0:15:53 > 0:15:55Dickens' plan worked.
0:15:55 > 0:15:57The first instalments were wildly successful,
0:15:57 > 0:15:59selling 100,000 copies a week.
0:16:00 > 0:16:03And the audience kept coming back for more,
0:16:03 > 0:16:07not least because of something very close to my heart, the cliff-hanger.
0:16:07 > 0:16:11You can't tell me what to do - you ain't my mother!
0:16:12 > 0:16:13Yes, I am!
0:16:14 > 0:16:18Back in the day, when I was trying to write three cliff-hangers a week
0:16:18 > 0:16:21on EastEnders, sometimes I had no idea where I was going to go next.
0:16:21 > 0:16:24Dickens tended to plan things a little bit better,
0:16:24 > 0:16:25he generally knew where he was going.
0:16:25 > 0:16:28And he was a genius at writing them too.
0:16:28 > 0:16:31This is one of my favourites, at the end of chapter 42.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34Pip's about to go through his door, when someone hands him a note.
0:16:35 > 0:16:38"I opened it, the watchman holding up his light,
0:16:38 > 0:16:43"and read inside, in Wemmick's writing, 'DON'T GO HOME.' "
0:16:43 > 0:16:45EASTENDERS DRUMBEAT
0:16:46 > 0:16:47This is clearly a man who knows
0:16:47 > 0:16:50how to keep an audience on the edge of their seat,
0:16:50 > 0:16:54to keep them reading, to keep them buying his magazine.
0:16:54 > 0:16:57And he must have realised that his audience would clamour
0:16:57 > 0:16:58for some kind of happy ending
0:16:58 > 0:17:01for the characters they'd spent the last year with,
0:17:01 > 0:17:03week in, week out.
0:17:03 > 0:17:07But I'm not convinced this is the whole story.
0:17:07 > 0:17:10Dickens was aware of his audience, but he didn't pander to them.
0:17:10 > 0:17:13So I don't believe he would change the ending
0:17:13 > 0:17:16just to keep his audience happy, any more than I believe
0:17:16 > 0:17:19he would change the ending because a friend told him to.
0:17:19 > 0:17:23So what else is behind his decision, or rather his indecision?
0:17:26 > 0:17:29I think that the answer may lie in Dickens' own story,
0:17:29 > 0:17:32in his intimate connection to the people and places
0:17:32 > 0:17:35of Great Expectations.
0:17:35 > 0:17:39For me there's something very personal at the heart of this novel.
0:17:41 > 0:17:44So in order to understand this ending a little better,
0:17:44 > 0:17:46we need to go back to the beginning,
0:17:46 > 0:17:51to the opening scenes of both the novel and Dickens' own childhood.
0:17:51 > 0:17:54He grew up here, close to the North Kent Marshes.
0:17:56 > 0:17:59For Dickens as a child, these marshes must have seemed
0:17:59 > 0:18:01like a particularly foreboding landscape,
0:18:01 > 0:18:04but he describes them beautifully in his book.
0:18:04 > 0:18:07"The dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard,
0:18:07 > 0:18:10"intersected with dykes and mounds and gates, was the marshes.
0:18:10 > 0:18:12"And that the distant savage lair
0:18:12 > 0:18:15"from which the wind was rushing was the sea;
0:18:15 > 0:18:17"and that the small bundle of shivers
0:18:17 > 0:18:22"growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was Pip."
0:18:24 > 0:18:26You can just imagine Dickens as a child,
0:18:26 > 0:18:29staring out at the hulks - these huge prison ships docked
0:18:29 > 0:18:33in the Medway - thinking what would happen if the prisoners escaped.
0:18:33 > 0:18:3840 years later, he turns this into the opening of Great Expectations.
0:18:40 > 0:18:43Dickens' early memories of this landscape helped inspire
0:18:43 > 0:18:45the setting, the feel of the story,
0:18:45 > 0:18:49but how much more of his life can we see in his work?
0:18:49 > 0:18:51Was it Dickens' own childhood that led him
0:18:51 > 0:18:53to write characters like Pip?
0:18:53 > 0:18:56He was obsessed with childhood, and it's partly because of his own.
0:18:56 > 0:19:01And he's brilliant at not just... the pleasures of childhood,
0:19:01 > 0:19:02you know, the imagination,
0:19:02 > 0:19:06the sense of wonder, but also the terrors of childhood.
0:19:06 > 0:19:09Pip talks about this in Great Expectations,
0:19:09 > 0:19:12he talks about terror a lot, and Dickens had
0:19:12 > 0:19:15a kind of photographic memory for those sorts of feelings.
0:19:15 > 0:19:17What about his relationship with his father
0:19:17 > 0:19:21cos obviously he's fatherless, if you like, in Great Expectations,
0:19:21 > 0:19:23so how did that play in, do you think?
0:19:23 > 0:19:26Well, so John Dickens was a spendthrift.
0:19:26 > 0:19:32And he was imprisoned for debt when Dickens was a young boy.
0:19:32 > 0:19:36Because of that, Dickens then had to go out to earn money,
0:19:36 > 0:19:39just a few pennies a day, and he was sent to work
0:19:39 > 0:19:41in this blacking warehouse,
0:19:41 > 0:19:44which is a word for... basically a shoe-polish factory.
0:19:44 > 0:19:48And that really bit into Dickens, those feelings of shame,
0:19:48 > 0:19:52those feelings that all his own expectations had been frustrated.
0:19:52 > 0:19:54And he never forgot it,
0:19:54 > 0:19:57and he never forgave his parents for making him do it.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01So Dickens as a child always felt that he deserved better
0:20:01 > 0:20:02or should have better, so, in a way,
0:20:02 > 0:20:05it's almost as though he had his own great expectations?
0:20:05 > 0:20:09He did. Full of ambition, but also full of the fear of failure.
0:20:09 > 0:20:11Great Expectations is a novel
0:20:11 > 0:20:14about how you become the person that you are,
0:20:14 > 0:20:17but also there's that nagging feeling that it might be taken away
0:20:17 > 0:20:21from you at any moment, which is, of course, exactly what happens to Pip.
0:20:21 > 0:20:23So do you think Dickens really identified with Pip?
0:20:23 > 0:20:25I think Dickens identifies with ALL his characters.
0:20:25 > 0:20:29He saw them all as strange distorted reflections of himself.
0:20:29 > 0:20:31But Pip was closer to him
0:20:31 > 0:20:35because Pip reflected the side of him that he'd never quite managed
0:20:35 > 0:20:39to get out of his system, and that's the hurt, lonely, abused boy
0:20:39 > 0:20:44that he felt he had been, and was like a bruise that would never heal.
0:20:47 > 0:20:51Dickens' obsession with his childhood was so strong
0:20:51 > 0:20:54that, in 1857, he moved back to Rochester,
0:20:54 > 0:20:57a stone's throw from where he'd grown up.
0:20:57 > 0:21:00It was here that he would write most of Great Expectations.
0:21:02 > 0:21:04This return to Rochester must have made his childhood memories
0:21:04 > 0:21:06all the more vivid.
0:21:06 > 0:21:10And as he sat down to write the novel, he filled it with people
0:21:10 > 0:21:13and places pulled directly from these streets.
0:21:16 > 0:21:19Dickens had often walked past Restoration House as a boy,
0:21:19 > 0:21:22struggling to imagine what went on inside.
0:21:22 > 0:21:24Now, seeing this palatial mansion again,
0:21:24 > 0:21:28he could re-imagine its story for Great Expectations.
0:21:30 > 0:21:33So in the book, Dickens gives Pip privileged access to the very
0:21:33 > 0:21:36same house, renames it Satis House, and imagines it to be
0:21:36 > 0:21:41Miss Havisham's lair, crumbling to pieces.
0:21:41 > 0:21:45This Satis House is at the heart of Pip and Estella's relationship
0:21:45 > 0:21:47throughout the novel.
0:21:47 > 0:21:51And Dickens has them return to the same spot for his revised ending.
0:21:53 > 0:21:55The end of this book is about Pip returning
0:21:55 > 0:21:58by going back to the place where the story started.
0:21:58 > 0:22:02I think this is Dickens saying, "I've come home."
0:22:05 > 0:22:08But when Pip returns to Satis House at the end of the novel,
0:22:08 > 0:22:12he has failed entirely to live up to his great expectations.
0:22:12 > 0:22:14Having spent most of the book
0:22:14 > 0:22:16believing he is destined for something,
0:22:16 > 0:22:18he ends up sinking into mediocrity.
0:22:20 > 0:22:22Could Charles Dickens have felt the same about himself,
0:22:22 > 0:22:25upon his own return?
0:22:25 > 0:22:27This is Gad's Hill Place in Rochester,
0:22:27 > 0:22:31where Dickens wrote most of Great Expectations.
0:22:31 > 0:22:34When Dickens was a boy, his father used to walk him past this house,
0:22:34 > 0:22:35telling his son that
0:22:35 > 0:22:38if ever one day he was successful enough, he should buy it.
0:22:38 > 0:22:41In 1856, when the house came on the market, Dickens by now was
0:22:41 > 0:22:44hugely successful, and that's exactly what he did.
0:22:46 > 0:22:50I think that gives us a real insight into how, even 40 years on,
0:22:50 > 0:22:52Dickens was still affected by his childhood.
0:22:56 > 0:23:00Most of the book was written here, in the study.
0:23:00 > 0:23:03As a writer, it's quite humbling to be in Charles Dickens' study.
0:23:03 > 0:23:05I feel like a bit of a fraud,
0:23:05 > 0:23:10a little bit like a Sunday league player trying on Pele's boots.
0:23:10 > 0:23:14Dickens tended to write here from ten to two every day.
0:23:14 > 0:23:17He was a quick worker, but could spend whole mornings sitting,
0:23:17 > 0:23:19staring into space, dreaming up stories.
0:23:22 > 0:23:25He loved mirrors. His daughter once caught him
0:23:25 > 0:23:28while he was writing, staring into a mirror, making strange faces
0:23:28 > 0:23:32and noises, creating characters and chiselling them in his mind.
0:23:36 > 0:23:39And when he wanted to escape his hectic household,
0:23:39 > 0:23:41he would simply stroll across his garden
0:23:41 > 0:23:45and into this tunnel which he had specially built, leading through
0:23:45 > 0:23:48to his own private wilderness on the other side of the road.
0:23:52 > 0:23:55He had a gargoyle installed at either end, bought from Italy -
0:23:55 > 0:23:58one representing comedy, the other tragedy.
0:23:58 > 0:24:00Kind of says it all.
0:24:01 > 0:24:06Comedy and tragedy, the twin pillars of Dickens's streaky-bacon genius,
0:24:06 > 0:24:12the dark and the light that played such a big role in his life.
0:24:12 > 0:24:14So here is Dickens in 1860.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17He's the rich, successful writer, a celebrity even,
0:24:17 > 0:24:20and living in the house he dreamt of owning when he was a child.
0:24:20 > 0:24:23You would think he would be content. Happy maybe?
0:24:24 > 0:24:27But Great Expectations doesn't really feel like a book
0:24:27 > 0:24:29written by a happy person.
0:24:29 > 0:24:31So I'm trying to get a sense of where Charles Dickens was
0:24:31 > 0:24:33when he was writing Great Expectations.
0:24:33 > 0:24:35What was going on in his life?
0:24:35 > 0:24:38The easiest way to sum it up is he's a little bit all over the place.
0:24:38 > 0:24:41In his life, he was going through
0:24:41 > 0:24:44probably the most major disruption,
0:24:44 > 0:24:48emotionally and psychologically, that he'd ever been through.
0:24:48 > 0:24:55In 1858, he publicly separated from his wife. At the same time
0:24:55 > 0:25:00he was almost definitely having an affair with a much younger actress,
0:25:00 > 0:25:04which he worked very, very hard to keep quiet.
0:25:04 > 0:25:09And he would actually rent houses under false names,
0:25:09 > 0:25:12a little bit like Dickens characters' names, to keep her there.
0:25:12 > 0:25:15He would take her back and forth to France.
0:25:15 > 0:25:18There were rumours that she had a termination of a pregnancy.
0:25:18 > 0:25:22All of this was done without the public's knowledge.
0:25:22 > 0:25:26And can you see any of this domestic turmoil in the book?
0:25:26 > 0:25:27Oh, absolutely.
0:25:27 > 0:25:32Pip has this absolute lifelong infatuation with Estella,
0:25:32 > 0:25:37whose name echoes the sounds of his real-life lover, Ellen Ternan.
0:25:37 > 0:25:40You have the Es, the Ls.
0:25:40 > 0:25:43Estella, as her name suggests, it means "star",
0:25:43 > 0:25:45it's kind of ice maiden.
0:25:45 > 0:25:49Ellen also was rumoured to be not quite as passionate
0:25:49 > 0:25:51about Dickens as he was about her.
0:25:51 > 0:25:56For him, she was the be all and end all, for her, we don't know.
0:25:56 > 0:26:00So I think a lot of this is written into Great Expectations.
0:26:00 > 0:26:02There are certain passages when I feel that,
0:26:02 > 0:26:06although it's Pip talking about Estella,
0:26:06 > 0:26:07there's times when I feel,
0:26:07 > 0:26:09is this Charles Dickens talking about Ellen Ternan?
0:26:09 > 0:26:12Love generally isn't Dickens's strong point.
0:26:12 > 0:26:15He usually makes love humorous or he writes it badly,
0:26:15 > 0:26:20and in Great Expectations we have these incredibly powerful
0:26:20 > 0:26:23convincing outpourings of love from Pip to Estella.
0:26:23 > 0:26:29But what we do see is a very different tone in this later novel
0:26:29 > 0:26:30from the cheerful earlier Dickens.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35It's quite bleak, quite tortured,
0:26:35 > 0:26:39and I think what's coming through is Dickens still was not happy,
0:26:39 > 0:26:42even though he may have been in an affair. But lots of feelings
0:26:42 > 0:26:47in the novel of frustration, pain, isolation and difficulty.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51Almost everything I have written has been personal at some level.
0:26:51 > 0:26:53I suppose I use writing as a kind of therapy
0:26:53 > 0:26:57to work out problems in my own life through my characters.
0:26:57 > 0:26:59And I think this is exactly what Dickens is doing here.
0:26:59 > 0:27:01It's clear that he invested something of himself,
0:27:01 > 0:27:03but not just in Pip -
0:27:03 > 0:27:07in BOTH these characters, in the very idea of Pip and Estella.
0:27:11 > 0:27:14What's remarkable about Great Expectations is that
0:27:14 > 0:27:17despite these difficult years - the most difficult of his life -
0:27:17 > 0:27:20Dickens responded with one of his great novels,
0:27:20 > 0:27:22one of THE great novels.
0:27:23 > 0:27:26As he lost control of events in his life,
0:27:26 > 0:27:29he tried to wrestle it back with his fiction, and with great success.
0:27:31 > 0:27:34All this wrangling and worry over the ending reflects both
0:27:34 > 0:27:37the novel as a whole and Dickens' state of mind.
0:27:37 > 0:27:40He was struggling, with the tone of his books,
0:27:40 > 0:27:42with audience expectations,
0:27:42 > 0:27:45with his past and with the way his life had turned out.
0:27:47 > 0:27:50An unhappy man, Dickens at first picked the bleaker ending,
0:27:50 > 0:27:52settling down in the shade.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55He was right to reject the idea of a simple happy ending.
0:27:55 > 0:27:57But he realised that these characters
0:27:57 > 0:27:59that he'd spent so long with
0:27:59 > 0:28:02deserved something better than a gloomy last goodbye.
0:28:04 > 0:28:07So he came up with something more ambiguous -
0:28:07 > 0:28:11Pip seeing no shadow of another parting from Estella.
0:28:11 > 0:28:15This new ending doesn't offer a definitive answer.
0:28:15 > 0:28:17He was too good a writer for that.
0:28:17 > 0:28:21But it offers some hope, a chink of light.
0:28:21 > 0:28:26In offering the possibility that these two imperfect characters could
0:28:26 > 0:28:30have a future together, he isn't simply giving in to other people.
0:28:30 > 0:28:33He wants it too.
0:28:33 > 0:28:36To me, it's kind of an exercise in wish fulfilment.
0:28:36 > 0:28:40In hinting at a happy ending for Pip,
0:28:40 > 0:28:43Charles Dickens is imagining one for himself.
0:28:46 > 0:28:49To dig deeper into Charles Dickens' Great Expectations,
0:28:49 > 0:28:51and the other books in this series,
0:28:51 > 0:28:55a free app from the Open University is available to download.
0:28:55 > 0:28:57Go to -
0:28:59 > 0:29:01Follow the links to the Open University.