Mrs. Gargery, Pip’s sadistic sister, administers Pip and her husband, Joe Gargery, a
spoon-full of Tar-water.
This high contrast scene in a room of questionable geometry welcomes two to Pip closely
intimate characters, with total opposite character traits, for the first time. The gentle
blacksmith Joe sits in front of the fire with a cup of Tar in his hand and looks sympa-
thetically to Pip. His wife forces Pip to take the pernicious medicine. In much the same
way she forces her follies on every one of her little household.
Already in this illustration I dropped the idea of the statue-like design of the scene,
as it was used in Chapter I. The characters look much more alive and the scene is also
better discernable without the help of an introductory text.
The first glimpse of Pip’s childhood house should remind the viewer of Pip’s poverty.
With this in mind I only put sparse furniture in a rather barren room with cold walls
and cold stoneplates and a table without a tablecloth. The black pictures on the wall
heighten the gloomy atmosphere.
No comments:
Post a Comment