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Provis
Harry Furniss
lithograph from pen-and-ink
1910
13.4 cm by 7.2 cm (5 ¼ by 2 ⅞ inches), vignetted
Dickens's Great Expectations, Charles Dickens Library Edition, facing p. 304.
[Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
. . . and so, in a sort of dream or sleep-waking, I found myself sitting by the fire again, waiting for — Him — to come to breakfast.
By and by, his door opened and he came out. I could not bring myself to bear the sight of him, and I thought he had a worse look by daylight.
“I do not even know,” said I, speaking low as he took his seat at the table, “by what name to call you. I have given out that you are my uncle.”
“That’s it, dear boy! Call me uncle.”
“You assumed some name, I suppose, on board ship?”
“Yes, dear boy. I took the name of Provis.”
“Do you mean to keep that name?”
“Why, yes, dear boy, it’s as good as another, — unless you’d like another.”
“What is your real name?” I asked him in a whisper.
“Magwitch,” he answered, in the same tone; “chrisen’d Abel.”
“What were you brought up to be?”
“A warmint, dear boy.”
He answered quite seriously, and used the word as if it denoted some profession. [Chapter XL, pp. 311-312]
The name "Abel Magwitch" suggests that Pup's convict is "handy" or competent (to say nothing of being the shepherd who was murdered by his brother Cain in the "Book of Genesis"), and that he seemingly possesses supernatural or magical powers. However, to elude the authorities he has travelled back from Australia under an assumed name which Furniss uses as the caption for his portrait of Pip's providential visitor: "Provis." His arrival turns Pip's comfortable life upside down, and leads to a series of sensational revelations, including the identities of Estella's parents, and Magwitch's death in prison after his accepting the justice of his sentence for dispatching his evil genius, Compeyson. "Provis" has within it echoes of "Providence," that, is the Divinely ordained plan for humanity. In particular, it seems to suggest that he is Pip's fate or destiny. Now much older and rather worn out by a hard life through which he has supplied Pip with Great Expectations, Magwitch, ex-convict, transported felon, and wealthy sheep-herder, returns to see the result of his largesse. Furniss makes him ill-suited to his middle-class clothing, and infinitely older than in his initial appearance in the narrative-pictorial sequence, Pip's Struggle with the Escaped Convict; indeed, he is a changed man, and later becomes an eloquent object for an indictment of the social order of Victorian England in the courtroom scene, Magwitch under Sentence of Death (Chapter 56).
Left: Frederic W. Pailthorpe's Robson and Kerslake Edition illustration of the return of Magwitch: On the stairs (1885). Centre: Edward Ardizzone's version of Magwitch's return: Pip has a visitor by night (1939). Right: F. A. Fraser's Household Edition portrait of Pip, shocked by Magwitch's revelations: I rose out of my chair, and stood with my hand upon the back of it, looking wildly at him (1876).
Allingham, Philip V. "The Illustrations for Great Expectations in Harper's Weekly (1860-61) and in the Illustrated Library Edition (1862) — 'Reading by the Light of Illustration'." Dickens Studies Annual, Vol. 40 (2009): 113-169.
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. Illustrated by John McLenan. [The First American Edition]. Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization, Vols. IV: 740 through V: 495 (24 November 1860-3 August 1861).
______. ("Boz."). Great Expectations. With thirty-four illustrations from original designs by John McLenan. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson (by agreement with Harper & Bros., New York), 1861.
______. Great Expectations. Illustrated by Marcus Stone. The Illustrated Library Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1862. Rpt. in The Nonesuch Dickens, Great Expectations and Hard Times. London: Nonesuch, 1937; Overlook and Worth Presses, 2005.
_____. Great Expectations. Illustrated by Sol Eytinge, Junior. Diamond Edition. 14 vols. Boston: Ticknor & Fields, 1867. XIII.
______. Great Expectations. Volume 6 of the Household Edition. Illustrated by F. A. Fraser. London: Chapman and Hall, 1876.
_____. Great Expectations. Illustrated by Frederic W. Pailthorpe with 17 hand-tinted water-colour lithographs. The Franklin Library. Franklin Center, Pennsylvania: 1979. Based on the Robson and Kerslake (London) edition, 1885.
______. Great Expectations. The Gadshill Edition. Illustrated by Charles Green. London: Chapman and Hall, 1898.
______. Great Expectations. The Grande Luxe Edition, ed. Richard Garnett. Illustrated by Clayton J. Clarke ('Kyd'). London: Merrill and Baker, 1900.
______. Great Expectations. "With 28 Original Plates by Harry Furniss." Volume 14 of the Charles Dickens Library Edition. London: Educational Book Co., 1910.
Paroissien, David. The Companion to "Great Expectations." Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 2000.
Created 16 February 2007 Last updated 24 October 2021