Monday, July 28, 2008

Mister Pip's Great Expectations of Matilda

The three passages I choose from Mister Pip were:
1) page 69 Mr. Watts is telling Matilda about losing his big toe, but how it's not that important that he's losing it because another one will grow back. "You gain as you lose, and vice versa." He tells her. I think I'm going to start my paper out with discussing losing and gaining. Matilda's world has been thrown upside down by this war that is going on. The island doesn't get any new supplies, they don't have electricity, or anything. But then the children gain a teacher. They gain a friend in Mr. Watts and in Pip. And even more, when Matilda loses those she loves on the island, she gains her father back. It's like a never ending circle.

2) page 123 "'We have all lost our possessions and many of us our homes,' he said. 'But these lessons, severe though they may seem, remind us of what no person can take, and that is our minds and our imaginations.'"Mr. Watts is explaining this to the children after the redskins destroy the village. He's telling them that no matter how many material possessions you have, no matter how rich or how poor you are, no one can take your mind. You will always have your beliefs, your dreams, your imagination. I think he's trying to give them hope. No matter how old Matilda got, Pip was always her friend.

3) page 231 Matilda is explaining the people ask her "Why Dickens?" and she tells them, "It gave me a friend in Pip. It taught me you can slip under the skin of another just as esily as your own, even when that skin is white and belongs to a boy alive in Dickens' England. Now, if that isn't an act of magic I don't know what is." It's back to the imagination that no one can take away from you. Matilda is continuing what Mr. Watts started she's showing people her friend and that he can be their friend too.

I feel that with these three passages I can conjure up The Great Expectations of Matilda!

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