ickens reworks his own childhood once again as a first-person
narrative in Great Expectations, his thirteenth novel but only
his second use of this highly subjective narrative point-of-view
— the first being David Copperfield (1849-50), which
encorporates the autobiographical fragment that Dickens never
published. Unlike his earlier picaresque young heroes such as
Nicholas Nickleby and Martin Chuzzlewit, Pip (more properly,
Philip Pirrip) and David are fully-developed, 'round'
characters. Just as a child would, Dickens divides his settings
and characters in both novels into the categories of “secure"
and “threatening." But Dickens continues to prize
distinctiveness in the drawing of the supporting characters.
Uniqueness of identity in both major and minor characters makes
the relatively 'flat' hero and heroine seem normal by comparison
to such odd ducks as Orlick and Wemmick. As in the earlier,
looser works such as The Pickwick Papers (1837) Dickens uses
natural dialogue to reveal character subtly and indirec