Plot Summary
Chapter 20 marks Pip's arrival in London and the beginning of the second stage of his expectations. After a five-hour coach journey, Pip finds the city overwhelming—immense, dirty, and ugly, though his patriotic instincts make him reluctant to admit it. He takes a hackney coach to Mr. Jaggers's office on Little Britain, near Smithfield, only to discover his guardian is away in court. Left to wait in Jaggers's dismal, skylight-lit room—furnished with an ominous black horsehair chair, rusty weapons, and two grotesque plaster casts of swollen faces—Pip grows increasingly uneasy and ventures outside.
Wandering into Smithfield, Pip finds the market district "all asmear with filth and fat and blood and foam." He stumbles upon Newgate Prison, where a half-drunk court officer offers him a tour of the gallows and the Debtors' Door, informing him that four prisoners will be hanged in two days. Shaken, Pip returns toward Jaggers's office and notices clusters of anxious clients waiting for the lawyer—two secretive men, two desperate women pleading for "Bill," and an excitable man who declares all other lawyers "Cag-Maggerth" compared to Jaggers.
When Jaggers finally arrives, Pip witnesses his guardian's commanding, intimidating manner as he dispatches each supplicant with curt authority, refusing to hear details and threatening to abandon their cases if they speak out of turn. Inside, Jaggers deals with Mike, whose attempt to procure a perjured witness backfires comically when the man turns out to be a visibly drunk and battered "confectioner." Finally, Jaggers informs Pip of his arrangements: lodging at Barnard's Inn with young Herbert Pocket, a generous allowance, and credit with London tradesmen. Pip is then handed off to Wemmick, Jaggers's clerk, who will walk him to his new lodging.
Character Development
This chapter dramatically expands our understanding of Mr. Jaggers, who transforms from a distant authority figure into a vividly rendered character. His absolute dominance over his clients—refusing to hear their words, threatening to drop their cases—reveals a man who controls every interaction through fear and calculated detachment. Yet there is a paradox: Jaggers clearly operates within the criminal underworld while maintaining a rigid code that prevents him from acknowledging the unsavory details of his work, as shown in the Mike scene where he erupts at any explicit mention of perjury.
Pip is cast as a naive observer throughout, overwhelmed by the grim realities of London that contrast sharply with his expectations of genteel life. His discomfort in Jaggers's office and his horror at Newgate reveal an innocence that the city will soon erode.
Themes and Motifs
The chapter powerfully develops the theme of justice and criminality. Pip's very first experiences in London immerse him in the machinery of punishment—Smithfield's slaughter, Newgate's gallows, and Jaggers's morally ambiguous legal practice. The proximity of Jaggers's office to both Smithfield and Newgate is no accident; it symbolizes how deeply intertwined law, commerce, and violence are in Dickens's London.
The theme of disillusionment emerges as Pip's grand expectations collide with squalid reality. London is not the glittering metropolis he imagined but a place of dirt, crime, and moral compromise. The motif of contamination runs throughout—Smithfield's filth "seemed to stick" to Pip, prefiguring the moral stain that wealth derived from questionable sources will leave on him.
Literary Devices
Irony pervades the chapter: Pip arrives expecting gentlemanly refinement but encounters slaughterhouses and gallows. Dickens employs dark humor in the court officer who hawks views of the Lord Chief Justice "like waxwork" and in the farcical parade of Jaggers's hapless clients. The symbolism of Jaggers's office—its coffin-like chair, death masks, and greasy walls worn by desperate clients—creates a visual metaphor for the dehumanizing nature of the legal system. Dickens uses dialect and speech patterns to distinguish characters vividly, from the lisping supplicant's "Mithter Jaggerth" to Mike's rough "Mas'r Jaggers," each voice revealing social position and desperation.