In what ways can we look at fiction as history in the novel Great Expectations?

Very concerned with the effects of the Industrial Revolution,
Charles Dickens perceived the changes to Victorian society.  A migration to London began with the
poor who lost jobs in the agrarian countryside to machinery which could do the harvesting.  In
London they willingly worked long hours and also sent their children to work in
factories.  Great Expectations also evinces Dickens's awareness of the rise
in criminality in London as destitute people lived in the streets.  Such characters as Magwitch
reflect this desperate life that many spent. 

With the rising
working class, the need for merchants increased.  Shops opened throughout London, such as that of
the corn chandler, Mr. Pumblechook.  Prior to the rise in the middle class, banking had been left
to business and had been relatively informal. Since there was not much exchange of money except
by a small circle who knew each other, there was no need for banks other than the Bank of England
which mainly handled government accounts. With the industrialization of England, more people had
money, so new banks opened to provide services as well as money for new businesses to open.  It
is a position in one of the new banks that Pip procures for his friend Herbert.  Evidence of the
new merchant class occurs in the chapter in which Pip goes to stay with Uncle Pumblechook and
Pumblechook watches all the other merchants. Moreover, the portrayal of Pumblechook who enviously
watches the other merchants and fawns before the eccentric Miss Havisham depicts the admiration
of the rising middle class for what Dickens felt was a frivolous upper class. In addition, with
the rising middle class, there also was a move away from the soot and crime in the city. 
Wemmick's house in the little town outside London evinces this migration from
London.