The Book That Changed Everythinng

This post links to Sunday Scribblings post 206 "The Book That Changed Everything".

As far as I can remember I have always been an avid reader, according to my family I started reading very early. The first book that I remember choosing and reading for myself was Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. I was only eight when we went to WHSmiths, I remember being bowled over by the sheer amount of books in there, and the vast cavernous size of the place (today it does not seem so huge, but I suppose I have grown now). I do not know what prompted me to choose this book, nor why I thought it would be an excellent idea to read it. I only remember what my father said to me "Are you sure, you can read that? It is quite hard".

I was resolute that this was the book for me, so we purchased it and took it home. I cannot remember whether I started reading it that night, but I know that I was mesmerized by the book. I found myself dreaming about the cover, wondering what the characters might be like in reality, where they might live if they were alive in my eight year old world. I felt a distinct connection with Pip and especially wanted him to be my brother (I only had sisters you see). I loved the descriptions that Dickens postulated within the story. Although I seemed to struggle a little with the language I remember feeling very special, and like an adult because I had chosen this special book and it was mine.

I was especially spellbound by the hold that Magwitch had over Pip and this first chance meeting is one of my favourite parts of the novel.

'"Hold your noise!" Cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among the graves at the side of the Church porch. "Keep still, you little devil, or I'll cut your throat!"
A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. 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 briar's; who limped, and shivered, and glared and growled; and whose teeth chattered in his head as he seized me by the chin.
"O! Don't cut my throat sir" I pleaded in terror. Pray don't do it sir"'

To the eight year old in me this had me spellbound, I was hooked, I could not get enough. Great Expectations became my literary companion. I have lost count now of the number of times I have read the novel, but it is one to which I turn after many weeks, months, years of reading, when I have exhausted my library and do not want to buy anything new. Although my tastes have broadened and there are many other books that have changed my life in varying ways it is this one which will always be my first love, the one that set me on my literary journey through life and the one which opened up so many fictitious doors.