The novel also uses a bleak churchyard on the Hoo Peninsula as inspiration for the scene where the young Pip meets escaped convict Magwitch in the openingchapter.
In an openingchapter on how the Middle East plays in American minds, he shows how moments in Middle Eastern history used to be reported in the National Geographic, a popular magazine that at least at one time was a window on the world for millions of middle-class Americans.
"The inauguration of this building, almost thirty years to the day after this institution was founded, brings to a close our early history while opening a major new chapter in the Museum's life, " Rochelle Slovin stated.