Great ExpectationsHow does Dickens allow the reader to sympathize with Pip and the Convict in the opening chapter of Great Expectations? On Christmas Eve, Phillip Pirrip nicknamed Pip, an An orphan boy raised by his sister, Mrs. Joe Gargery, and her husband meets a scary man in the gloomy, nettle-covered village churchyard. The man, an escaped convict from a prison ship, scares Pip into stealing some food and a file to remove his leg chain. Pip's kindness warms the prisoner's heart. The condemned man, however, waits many years to truly demonstrate his gratitude. The novel is written in the first-person perspective and the story is revealed from the point of view of Pip, who is also the protagonist of the story. However the only drawback is that we do not see the point of view of any other character except that of Pips, making the novel biased. Dickens presents the history of Pip's family through Pip's description of the gravestones. He does this by having Pip read the names of dead family members from the gravestones. Both of Pip's parents had died and all of his siblings had died as infants, which makes the reader sympathize with Pip. Life as an orphaned boy in the 19th century seemed horrible in Great Expectations. The reason for this is that the way Pip was treated by his sister was harsh and cruel and his sister felt that Pip was a "burden" on her. Pip received almost no sympathy from his sister who was literally his only blood relative, so it was quite sad to make the picture of an orphaned boy's life sad and miserable. The language that Dickens uses in Great Expectations makes the atmosphere cold, scary and mysterious. "I found out for sure that this squalid place covered in nettles was the church... middle of paper... which had left Pip was most comfortable. Pip's character at this point is a young boy being terrorized by a man big and cruel. However there is some sympathy between the inmate and the reader because, the inmate is doing what he is doing just to survive, so it's almost like "do or die". two characters who are neglected and hurt, so they are almost similar but different because Pip is just a little boy with a cruel and uncaring sister and the convict is a great man with the law behind him The Victorian society of the time was very cruel and harsh because life It was very difficult to make a living, therefore there were a lot of poor people and some people even had to turn to theft to survive. So there was a lot of overcrowding in the prisons and there were a lot of death sentences. To sum up, life in the 19th century was very hard.