Jack Noel: Comic Classics: Great Expectations

With thanks/apologies to Charles Dickens

ORIGINAL STORY BY CHARLES DICKENS ABRIDGED BY LIZ BANKES DESIGNED AND ILLUSTRATED BY JACK NOEL EDITED BY LIZ BANKES WITH LUCY COURTENAY ART-DIRECTION BY LIZZIE GARDINER WITH MARGARET HOPE PRODUCTION CHARLOTTE COOPER AND TEAM FOREIGN RIGHTS JULIETTE CLARK AND TEAM SALES JAS FYFE, DAN DOWNHAM AND TEAM PUBLISHER ALI DOUGAL AGENT CLAIRE WILSON WITH MIRIAM TOBIN AT RCW SPECIAL THANKS TO CHARLOTTE KNIGHT

First published in Great Britain in 2020 by Egmont UK Limited

2 Minster Court, 10th floor, London EC3R 7BB

Text and illustrations copyright © 2020 Jack Noel

The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted

First e-book edition 2020

ISBN 978 1 4052 9404 1

Ebook ISBN 978 1 4052 9405 8

www.egmont.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet.

Egmont takes its responsibility to the planet and its inhabitants very seriously. We aim to use papers from well-managed forests run by responsible suppliers.

CONTENTS

Cover

Dedication and Copyright With thanks/apologies to Charles Dickens ORIGINAL STORY BY CHARLES DICKENS ABRIDGED BY LIZ BANKES DESIGNED AND ILLUSTRATED BY JACK NOEL EDITED BY LIZ BANKES WITH LUCY COURTENAY ART-DIRECTION BY LIZZIE GARDINER WITH MARGARET HOPE PRODUCTION CHARLOTTE COOPER AND TEAM FOREIGN RIGHTS JULIETTE CLARK AND TEAM SALES JAS FYFE, DAN DOWNHAM AND TEAM PUBLISHER ALI DOUGAL AGENT CLAIRE WILSON WITH MIRIAM TOBIN AT RCW SPECIAL THANKS TO CHARLOTTE KNIGHT First published in Great Britain in 2020 by Egmont UK Limited 2 Minster Court, 10th floor, London EC3R 7BB Text and illustrations copyright © 2020 Jack Noel The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted First e-book edition 2020 ISBN 978 1 4052 9404 1 Ebook ISBN 978 1 4052 9405 8 www.egmont.co.uk A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet. Egmont takes its responsibility to the planet and its inhabitants very seriously. We aim to use papers from well-managed forests run by responsible suppliers.

Title Page

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

CHAPTER XVII

CHAPTER XVIII

CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XX

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MY FATHER’S FAMILY name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than PIP.

So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called PIP.

I never saw my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long before the days of photographs).

My first ideas regarding what they were like were unreasonably derived from their tombstones.

The shape of the letters on my father’s tombstone gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair.

From my mother’s, I drew a childish conclusion that she was freckled and sickly.

AND SO MY STORY BEGINS

It was a memorable raw afternoon towards evening.

This bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard;

where

PHILIP PIRRIP,

late of this parish ,

and also

GEORGIANA

wife of the above,

were dead

and buried.

The dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes.

The low leaden line beyond was the river;

and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing was the sea.

And the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was PIP.

A man with no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied round his head. A man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and stung by nettles, and torn by briars; who limped, and shivered, and glared, and growled; and whose teeth chattered in his head as he seized me by the chin.