The book includes three "stages" of Pip's expectations.
First stage
Philip "Pip" Pirrip is a seven-year-old orphan who lives with his hot-tempered older sister and her kindly blacksmith husband Joe Gargery on the coastal marshes of Kent. On Christmas Eve 1812,[14] Pip visits the graves of his parents and siblings. There, he unexpectedly encounters an escaped convict who threatens to kill him if he does not bring back food and tools. Pip steals a file from among Joe's tools and a pie and brandy that were meant for Christmas dinner, which he delivers to the convict.
That evening, Pip's sister is about to look for the missing pie when soldiers arrive and ask Joe to mend some shackles. Joe and Pip accompany them into the marshes to recapture the convict, who is fighting with another escaped convict. The first convict confesses to stealing food, clearing Pip.[15]
Pip is ashamed of Joe at Satis House, by Francis Arthur FraserA few years later, Miss Havisham, a wealthy and reclusive spinster who lives in dilapidated Satis House wearing her old wedding dress after having been jilted at the altar, asks Mr Pumblechook, a relative of the Gargerys, to find a boy to visit her. Pip visits Miss Havisham and falls in love with Estella, her adopted daughter. Estella is aloof and hostile to Pip, which Miss Havisham encourages. During one visit, another boy picks a fistfight with Pip, where Pip easily gains the upper hand. Estella watches, and allows Pip to kiss her afterwards. Pip visits Miss Havisham regularly, until he is old enough to learn a trade.[16]
Joe accompanies Pip for the last visit to Miss Havisham, at which she gives Pip money to become an apprentice blacksmith. Joe's surly assistant, Dolge Orlick, is envious of Pip and dislikes Mrs. Joe. Orlick also complains when Joe says he needs to take Pip somewhere midday, thinking this is another sign of favoritism, of which Joe assures him he can quit work for the day. When Pip and Joe are away from the house, Joe's wife is brutally attacked, leaving her unable to speak or do her work. When Pip sees a leg iron was the weapon used in the attack, he becomes worried believing that it was the same leg iron he helped liberate the convict from. Now bedridden, Mrs. Joe is unable to be as "rampaging" towards Pip as before the attack. Pip's former schoolmate Biddy joins the household to help with her care.[17]
Miss Havisham with Estella and Pip. Art by H. M. BrockFour years into Pip's apprenticeship, Mr Jaggers, a lawyer, informs him that he has been provided with money from an anonymous patron, allowing him to become a gentleman. Presuming that Miss Havisham is his benefactress, Pip visits her before leaving for London.[18]
Second stage
Pip's first experience with urban England is a shock, for London is not the "soft white city" Pip imagined, but a place of heavy litter and filth. Pip moves into Barnard's Inn with Herbert Pocket, the son of his tutor, Matthew Pocket, who is Miss Havisham's cousin. Pip realizes Herbert is the boy he fought with years ago. Herbert tells Pip how Miss Havisham was defrauded and deserted by her fiancé. Pip meets fellow pupils, Bentley Drummle, a brute of a man from a wealthy noble family, and Startop, who is a more agreeable colleague. Jaggers disburses the money Pip needs.[19] During a visit, Pip meets Jaggers's housekeeper Molly, a former convict.
When Joe visits Pip at Barnard's Inn, Pip is ashamed to be seen with him. Joe relays a message from Miss Havisham that Estella will be visiting her. Pip returns there to meet Estella and is encouraged by Miss Havisham, but he avoids visiting Joe. He is disquieted to see Orlick now in service to Miss Havisham. He mentions his misgivings to Jaggers, who promises Orlick's dismissal. Back in London, Pip and Herbert exchange their romantic secrets: Pip adores Estella and Herbert is engaged to Clara. Pip meets Estella when she is sent to Richmond to be introduced into society.[20]
Pip and Herbert build up debts. Mrs Joe dies and Pip returns to his village for her funeral. Pip's income is fixed at £500 (equivalent to £45,000 in 2021) per annum when he comes of age at 21. With the help of Jaggers' clerk, John Wemmick, Pip plans to help advance Herbert's future prospects by anonymously securing him a position with the shipbroker, Clarriker's. Pip takes Estella to Satis House, where she and Miss Havisham quarrel over Estella's coldness. In London, Drummle outrages Pip by proposing a toast to Estella. Later, at an Assembly Ball in Richmond, Pip witnesses Estella meeting Drummle and warns her about him; she replies that she has no qualms about entrapping him.[21]
A week after his 23rd birthday, Pip learns that his benefactor is the convict he encountered in the churchyard, Abel Magwitch, who had been transported to New South Wales after being captured. He has become wealthy after gaining his freedom there, but cannot return to England on pain of death. However, he returns to see Pip, who was the motivation for all his success.
Third stage
A shocked Pip stops taking Magwitch's money, but devises a plan with Herbert to help him escape from England.[22] Magwitch shares his past with Pip, and reveals that the escaped convict whom he fought in the churchyard was Compeyson, the fraudster who had deserted Miss Havisham.[23]
Pip returns to Satis House to visit Estella and meets Drummle, who has also come to see her and now has Orlick as his servant. Pip confronts Miss Havisham for misleading him about his benefactor, but she says she did it to annoy her relatives. Pip declares his love to Estella, who coldly tells him that she plans on marrying Drummle. A heartbroken Pip returns to London, where Wemmick warns him that Compeyson is looking for him.[24]
At Jaggers's house at dinner, Wemmick tells Pip how Jaggers acquired his maidservant, Molly, rescuing her from the gallows when she was accused of murder.[25] A remorseful Miss Havisham tells Pip how she raised Estella to be unfeeling and heartless ever since Jaggers brought her in as an infant with no information on her parentage. She also tells Pip that Estella is now married. She gives Pip money to pay for Herbert's position at Clarriker's, and asks for his forgiveness. As Pip is about to leave, Miss Havisham's dress catches fire, and Pip injures himself in an unsuccessful attempt to save her. Realising that Estella is the daughter of Molly and Magwitch, Pip is discouraged by Jaggers from acting on his suspicions.[26]
Magwitch makes himself known to PipA few days before Magwitch's planned escape, Pip is tricked by an anonymous letter into going to a sluice-house near his old home, where he is seized by Orlick, who intends to murder him and freely admits to injuring Pip's sister. As Pip is about to be struck with a hammer, Herbert and Startop arrive and save him. The three of them pick up Magwitch to row him to the steamboat for Hamburg, but they are met by a police boat carrying Compeyson, who has offered to identify Magwitch. Magwitch seizes Compeyson, and they fight in the river. Seriously injured, Magwitch is taken by the police. Compeyson's body is found later.[27]
Aware that Magwitch's fortune will go to the Crown after his trial, Pip visits a dying Magwitch in the prison hospital, and eventually tells him that his daughter Estella is alive. Herbert, who is preparing to move to Cairo, Egypt to manage Clarriker's office, offers Pip a position there. After Herbert's departure, Pip falls ill in his room, and faces arrest for debt. However, Joe nurses Pip back to health and pays off the debt. After recovering, Pip then returns to propose to Biddy, only to find that she has married Joe. Pip apologises to Joe, vows to repay him and leaves for Cairo. There he moves in with Herbert and Clara, and eventually advances to become third in the company. Only then does Herbert learn that Pip paid for his position in the firm.[28]
After working for eleven years in Egypt, Pip returns to England and visits Joe, Biddy, and their son, Pip Jr. Then, in the ruins of Satis House, he meets the widowed Estella, who asks Pip to forgive her, assuring him that her misfortune, and her abusive marriage to Drummle until his death, has opened her heart. As Pip takes Estella's hand, and they leave the moonlit ruins, he sees "no shadow of another parting from her".[29]
