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GREAT EXPECTATIONS David Nicholls' version of Dickens' classic opens in cinemas this week. Read the chilling opening passage here My father's family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip. I give Pirrip as my father's family name, on the authority of his tombstone and my sister—Mrs. Joe Gargery, who married the blacksmith. As I never saw my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long before the days of photographs), my first fancies regarding what they were like were unreasonably derived from their tombstones. MORE >
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HOW TO BE A HOBBIT As The Hobbit is released next month, we look at Bilbo's special journey The Hobbit is a tale of adventure. It is also a story of personal growth. At the beginning of the tale Bilbo is a conventional, unadventurous, comfort-loving hobbit, but as the story progresses he grows in courage, wisdom and self-confidence. The Hobbit is similar in this respect to The Lord of the Rings; both are tales, J.R.R. Tolkien informs us, of the ennoblement of the humble. Both are stories of ordinary persons – small in the eyes of the 'wise' and powerful – who accomplish great things and achieve heroic stature by accepting challenges, enduring hardships, and drawing on unsuspected strengths of character and will. MORE >

I, ANNA The film adaptation of Elsa Lewin's thriller opens this week There is something I’m trying to remember. It keeps slipping away, gliding in and out of my consciousness, like the moon tantalising the clouds. It shows itself, glittering cruelly, beautiful and evil, and then slips furtively away, out of sight, leaving darkness and confusion. Leaving fear. Maybe if there was someone to talk to…    It’s Sunday. I’m not sure I know why I’m talking into this tape recorder. It belongs to my daughter Emmy. Maybe I just want to talk to someone, and there is no one. I don’t have any women friends anymore. Maybe I never did. It doesn’t matter. You lose your friends when you lose your husband.   MORE >