How is loneliness portrayed in Great Expectations?

In Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, loneliness is conveyed through the use of setting, pathetic fallacy, and characterization.

The novel opens with a desolate setting that imitates the emotion of the orphan Pip, who describes his first impression of things occurring "on a memorable raw afternoon toward evening." He later learns that the place in which he walks is the churchyard where his parents are buried.

I knew that the dark flat wilderness beyond was the marshes; and that the low leaden line beyond was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing was the sea. (Ch.1)

This use of pathetic fallacy (that is, the treatment of inanimate things as if they are human, with feelings, thoughts, or emotions) gives the sea a dangerous quality; it is described as being a "savage lair." The bleakness of the marshes and surrounding area suggest loneliness; the headstones with the names of his father and mother certainly convey little Pip's sense of being alone in the world.

In chapter 8, setting connotes loneliness, when Pip goes to Satis House on the request of Miss Havisham to bring a boy to play with her ward, Estella. As the young girl leads Pip up to the rooms of the house where they will play, Pip describes a lonely scene.

. . . the passages were all dark, and that she had left a candle burning there. She took it up, and we went through more passages and up a staircase, and still it was all dark, and only the candle lighted us. (Ch.8)

When Pip first encounters Miss Havisham, his impression of her depicts her strange and isolated appearance. Pip states that it is as though he "had been taken to one of our old marsh churches to see a skeleton in the ashes of a rich dress that had been dug out of a vault under the church pavement."

Miss Havisham sits alone in a dark room, wearing a decaying wedding dress. She sat, "corpse-like, as we played at cards." Later, Pip remarks,

I have often thought since, that she must have looked as if the admission of the natural light of day would have struck her to dust.

In chapter 38, Estella returns to Satis House where Miss Havisham scolds Estella for her coldness towards her. Estella replies that Miss Havisham has made her what she is.

“O, look at her, look at her!” cried Miss Havisham, bitterly; “Look at her so hard and thankless, on the hearth where she was reared! Where I took her into this wretched breast when it was first bleeding from its stabs, and where I have lavished years of tenderness upon her!” (Ch.38)

Miss Havisham has meant to avenge herself upon men through Estella, but she has not intended for Estella to be cruel to her. Estella explains that she can only be what she has been made to be, and Miss Havisham has formed her nature and caused her to become hard and cruel. The lonely Miss Havisham exclaims that Estella demonstrates no love for her.

“But to be proud and hard to me!” Miss Havisham quite shrieked, as she stretched out her arms. “Estella, Estella, Estella, to be proud and hard to me!”

“Would it be weakness to return my love?” exclaimed Miss Havisham. “But yes, yes, she would call it so!” (Ch.38)

These depictions of Miss Havisham convey her sense of loneliness and isolation.