FREE ESSAY ON ESTELLA - MISS HAVISHAM

ESTELLA - MISS HAVISHAM

Estella - Miss Havisham's beautiful young ward, Estella is Pip's unattainable dream
throughout the novel. He loves her passionately, but though she sometimes seems to
consider him a friend, she is usually cold, cruel, and disinterested in him. As they grow
up together, she repeatedly warns him that she has no heart. Though she does not know it
herself--and though Pip does not learn it until almost the end of the novel--Estella is
the daughter of Magwitch, the convict Pip aids as a child. Through the intercession of
the lawyer Jaggers, she is adopted by Miss Havisham, who raises Estella into a life of
wealth and social status for her own ulterior motives.
Miss Havisham - Miss Havisham is the wealthy, eccentric old woman who lives in a manor
called Satis House near Pip's village. She is manic and often seems insane, flitting
around her house in a faded wedding dress, keeping a decaying feast on her table, and
surrounding herself with clocks stopped at twenty till nine. As a young woman, Miss
Havisham was left at the altar on her wedding day, and now she has a vendetta against all
men. She deliberately raises Estella as the tool of her revenge, training her beautiful
ward to break men's hearts.