What happens in Chapter XXI of Great Expectations?
Pip walks with Mr. Wemmick from Mr. Jaggers's office to Barnard's Inn, where he will be staying with Mr. Pocket, Junior. As they stroll, Pip observes Wemmick more closely: he's a short, rigid man with a wooden expression, dressed with mourning rings and seals. Wemmick speaks cynically about the perils of London and seldom smiles; Pip quickly realizes that his smiles are automatic. Wemmick mentions that Mr. Matthew Pocket lives about five miles west in Hammersmith and drops Pip off at Barnard's Inn before heading off. Pip is taken aback by Barnard's Inn; it’s nothing like the grand hotel he had imagined. Instead, it’s a bleak, decaying courtyard filled with shabby rooms that smell of rot. He waits alone in Mr. Pocket Junior's rooms for nearly half an hour, scratching his name into the dirt on the windowpanes, until he hears footsteps that signal his host's arrival. Mr. Pocket, Junior appears looking a bit winded, carrying paper bags and a pottle of strawberries he picked up from Covent Garden Market to welcome Pip. He apologizes for being late, shows Pip around the modest lodgings, and explains how things work — meals will come from the coffee-house at Pip's expense, as instructed by Mr. Jaggers. As Pip hands back the fruit bags, they both suddenly realize who the other is: Pocket calls Pip "the prowling boy," and Pip recognizes Pocket as the pale young gentleman.
Analysis
The chapter unfolds as a journey marked by unmet expectations, transitioning from the street to Barnard's Inn and culminating in a moment of humorous realization. Pip tells the story from his perspective, and his insights are influenced by the disparity between what he anticipates and what he encounters—a disparity that the chapter cleverly highlights twice: first with Wemmick's mechanical non-smile, which Pip only understands at the top of Holborn Hill, and then with Barnard's Inn, which he had envisioned as a luxurious hotel. The lengthy Gothic depiction of the Inn—"dry rot and wet rot and all the silent rots," the windows in "every stage of dilapidated blind and curtain," and the "To Let, To Let, To Let" glaring from empty rooms—accumulates decay with dark comedic flair, culminating in the mock-advertisement "Try Barnard's Mixture." This satirical portrayal of Barnard as a vengeful spirit, with his inn undergoing "penance and humiliation as a mere dust-hole," establishes the tone of ironic disappointment that the chapter's title phrase, "the first of my great expectations," makes clear. Wemmick is introduced through an extended metaphor of woodworking: his face "imperfectly chipped out with a dull-edged chisel," his mouth described as "such a post-office of a mouth." This imagery of mechanical creation stands in contrast to the warmth Pip anticipates from life in London. The chapter concludes with a clever twist: the formal introduction of Pip and Pocket shifts into mutual recognition, as the stiff social formality gives way to a shared recollection of a childhood fight, signaled by the mirrored exclamations that close the chapter.
Key quotes from Chapter XXI
““You may get cheated, robbed, and murdered in London. But there are plenty of people anywhere, who’ll do that for you.””
Wemmick responds to Pip's question about whether London is a very wicked place, during their walk together.
“His mouth was such a post-office of a mouth that he had a mechanical appearance of smiling.”
Pip describes Wemmick's face as they walk along, before realising the smile is not real.
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