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Characters and social class in bernard shaw’s pygmalion
Characters and social class in bernard shaw’s pygmalion
Characters and social class in bernard shaw’s pygmalion
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George Bernard Shaw was the son of an unsuccessful merchant. His mother was a singer who left his father to teach a singing class in London. At the age of fourteen, Shaw left school to work in an agent’s office. In 1876, he went to London where, supported by his parents, he wrote five novels (Columbia). All five novels were written in Shaw’s youth and were about the subjects that interested him most at that time. Those subjects were marriage, the role of artists in society, and the order of society (Satyanarayana). When his novels were widely rejected by publishers, he turned his attention to politics. In 1884, he joined the Fabian Society. This was a socialist group whose goal was to transform England through a more intellectual foundation. The year after he joined the Fabian Society, Shaw began working by writing book reviews and was an art, theater, and music critic. In 1895, he became a theater critic for the Saturday Review. It was at that point that Shaw began writing his own plays (“George”). George Bernard Shaw is one of the greatest playwrights; he used skillful techniques to address the issues of his time in his plays and won many awards for his work.
Gender discrimination was a major issue in Shaw’s time. He discussed this issue in his play Pygmalion. Shaw was a supporter of women’s rights and was against the idea that women were only objects to men. Pygmalion is a Greek myth that shows men’s attitudes towards women. Pygmalion, the King of Cyprus, had problems with women, so he decided to stay single. He turned to art and made a sculpture from ivory. The sculpture was so beautiful that Pygmalion fell in love. He named her Galatea. During a festival, he asked Aphrodite to grant his wish and she did. Galatea came alive a...
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RM, plc. “George Bernard Shaw.” Hutchinson’s Biography Database (2011): 1. History Reference Center. Web. 3 April 2014.
Satyanarayana, P. “George Bernard Shaw as an unknown novelist.” Language In India June 2013: 691. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 2 April 2014.
Schanker, Harry H. and Katharine Anne Ommanney. The Stage and the School. New York: Glencoe, 1989. Print.
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