Pip's Mysterious Benefactor In Great Expectations

Pip’s mysterious benefactor.
Victim both of society and of Compeyson.
Common-law husband of Molly, Jaggers’ maid.
Transported for life to Australia.
Becomes a wealthy sheep farmer and stock breeder.
Estella’s real father, though this is not revealed until late in the novel.
Magwitch’s first name, Abel, is another example of Dickens’ use of charactonym. Although Magwitch may look like a desperate murderer at various points in the novel, his forename identifies him as a victim as opposed to a slayer. Cain and Abel were sons of Adam and Eve, and it was
Cain who committed the first ever murder when he killed his brother. The biblical Abel is also a shepherd, which further strengthens the comparison.
The religious symbolism inherent in this name ties in

This is the morally flawed, fallen world that humanity has inherited. Hence the references in Chapter 5 to a ‘dismal wilderness’ with its ‘wicked Noah’s ark’.
Magwitch is another of the limited number of characters in Great
Expectations who grow through time. He is crucial to the development of the plot as he is the unnamed benefactor behind Pip’s sudden change in circumstances. Furthermore, because he insists on secrecy, Magwitch’s structural role in the novel is to enable both Pip and the reader to be misled into assuming that Miss Havisham is the benefactor and, more importantly, into assuming that it is Miss Havisham who has ultimately destined Pip to be betrothed to Estella. As well as helping to drive the action of the entire novel, Magwitch also provides much of the tension and suspense that engage the reader’s interest in the opening chapters.
On his first appearance, Magwitch is a desperate figure, prepared to cut the throat of a young child (Chapter 1, p.4). Dickens subtly maintains sympathy for him, however, by referring to his hunger, his various wounds and his uncontrollable shivering. His second meeting with Pip (Chapter 3,
p.19) reveals a gentle and more gracious nature as he politely