Great Expectations Characters

Pip. What a simple name for such a complex guy. That’s right, he’s deep as the English Channel and more multi-dimensional than an M.C. Escher drawing. We’re a bit attached to him,...

Joe is Pip’s sister’s husband and is Pip’s initial hero. Joe is a blacksmith and has little education. His father was an alcoholic, and prevented Joe from going to school. He had...

Miss Havisham is the owner of Satis House, as well as Estella’s adoptive mother. She is a little bit off of her rocker. Jilted on the day of her wedding (some 25 years before Pip’s firs...

Magwitch’s first memory is of stealing turnips. He joins Pip and Estella in the Orphan Club, having never known his parents and having never had a family. In an effort to survive, Magwitch ha...

Estella is the star, our protagonist’s love interest. She lights up the novel with her unrivaled beauty (we’re talking Helen of Troy, here), and she freezes the world around her faster...

Mr. Jaggers is Pip’s guardian, Miss Havisham’s lawyer, and the best lawyer we’ve ever met. He is exactly like Billy Flynn in the movie Chicago, in that he knows the ins and outs o...

Mr. Wemmick is Jaggers’s clerk (a.k.a. sidekick) who lives in a self-built castle. He has two very different personalities, depending on where he is. When he is in London, he is all business...

Herbert is Pip’s best friend. The two first meet when they are little boys at Miss Havisham’s house. Herbert challenges Pip to a gentlemanly fight (there are rules and everything), whic...

Orlick for a time is employed as Joe’s tempestuous journeyman – who is threatened by Pip and who worries that Pip will one day replace him at the forge. Pip is convinced that Orlick is...

The Aged is Wemmick’s father who lives in the castle with Wemmick. He is a bit hard of hearing, but loves being nodded at and loves to lower the drawbridge. When he reads aloud, he reads a-LO...

Mrs. Joe is an angry, aggressive woman whom neither Joe nor Pip can ever please. She believes in corporal punishment, and has a favorite torture device call the Tickler, a wax-ended cane. She likes...

Bentley Drummle is Pip’s lifelong nemesis. He’s mean, haughty, and abrasive. Oh, and did we mention, rich? Jaggers actually likes Drummle, but tells Pip to stay away from him. Jaggers g...

Startop is Pip’s friend and fellow student of Mr. Pocket’s. He, along with Herbert, saves Pip from being killed by Orlick, and he helps Pip and Magwitch make their great escape at the e...

Besides being a professional swindler, counterfeiter, and general law-breaker, Compeyson is the man who jilted Miss Havisham at the altar all of those many years ago. He was in cahoots with Arthur...

Arthur is Miss Havisham’s rebellious, ungrateful half brother who plots against her and swindles her. He is the son of Miss Havisham’s father and the family cook. Mr. Havisham, Sr., lef...

Molly is Jaggers’ maid who we later discover is also Estella’s mother. Jaggers defended Molly years before when she had been accused of murdering a woman in a barn out of jealousy. Moll...

Matthew Pocket is Miss Havisham’s cousin and the only member of her family who spoke his mind about her fiancé, Compeyson. He told her he was not a true gentleman and that he had serious...

Belinda Pocket is Mr. Pocket’s spoiled wife who can’t hold a baby to save her life. She is obsessed with titles of nobility and constantly reads a book about such titles. Her father had...

The other Pockets are comprised of Miss Havisham’s cousins who kiss butt like no one’s business in the hopes of staking a claim in Miss Havisham’s fortune. They are incredibly jea...

The Avenger is Pip’s servant boy who he hires in order that he can seem like a more legit gentleman. The problem is, beyond putting toast on the table and yelling people’s names when th...

Trabb’s boy is the local bully and rebel. He’s Mr. Trabb the tailor’s son, and he likes to make fun of Pip and of how too-cool-for-school Pip has become. He’s kind of like t...

Mr. Wopsle is the town preacher with a fierce love of drama who eventually leaves the clergy to pursue his love of theater in London. Pip goes to see his performances, and is amused by Wopsle’...

Mr. Pumblechook is Joe’s uncle, but Mrs. Joe considers him to be one of her BFFs. He is the local seedsman (he sells seeds and stuff) and is charged with escorting Pip to Miss Havisham’...

Clara is Herbert’s Pockets love and fiancée. She lives at Mill Brook Pond at a boarding house with her irascible, alcoholic father (a retired ship’s purser) who she tends to on han...

Miss Skiffins is Mr. Wemmick’s love interest and, later, wife. She is very proper and always wears gloves. She doesn’t lets Wemmick put his arm around her until they are married.

An orphan who teaches Pip to read and who takes care of Mrs. Joe after the attack, Biddy is a kind and thoughtful young woman who has romantic feelings for Pip but ends up marrying Joe Gargery.Supe...