Domestic Images in Great Expectations

“I an’t a—going to have no formal cramming and busting and washing up now, with what I’ve got before me, I promise you!”

So, we had our slices served out, as if we were two thousand troops on a forced march instead of a man and boy at home; and we took gulps of milk and water, with apologetic countenances, from a jug on the dresser. Mrs. Joe was a very clean housekeeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more uncomfortable and unacceptable than dirt itself. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, and some people do the same by their religion. (Chap. 4)

Pip Does not Enjoy his Christmas Dinner, Great Expectations

Mrs. Pocket And Her Family by Harry Furniss. 1910 edition of Dickens’ Great Expectations

Lifting the latch of a gate, we passed direct into a little garden overlooking the river, where Mr. Pocket’s children were playing about. And unless I deceive myself on a point where my interests or prepossessions are certainly not concerned, I saw that Mr. and Mrs. Pocket’s children were not growing up or being brought up, but were tumbling up. . . I had an opportunity of observing the remarkable family phenomenon that whenever any of the children strayed near Mrs. Pocket in their play, they always tripped themselves up and tumbled over her—always very much to her momentary astonishment, and their own more enduring lamentation.Chap 22

Great Expectations, Pip and Mrs Pocket in the garden at Hammersmith.

"Molly, let them see both your wrists. Show them. Come!"John McLenan for Dickens’ Great Expectations

Biddy and Pip from Great Expectations“Ill Used” It may have been about a month after my sister's reappearance in the kitchen, when Biddy came to us with a small speckled box containing the whole of her worldly effects, and became a blessing to the household. Above all, she was a blessing to Joe, for the dear old fellow was sadly cut up by the constant contemplation of the wreck of his wife, and had been accustomed, while attending on her of an evening, to turn to me every now and then and say, with his blue eyes moistened, `Such a fine figure of a woman as she once were, Pip!' Biddy instantly taking the cleverest charge of her as though she had studied her from infancy, Joe became able in some sort to appreciate the greater quiet of his life, and to get down to the Jolly Bargemen now and then for a change that did him good. (Chap 15)

Charles Dickens Bleak House “Nurse and Patient’

"Mrs. Gamp, on the Art of Nursing“ illustration from Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit.

Wemmick and "The Aged“ from Great Expectations

Great Expectations Clara and her father: “Here's old Bill Barley, bless your eyes”