The society at the time Pygmalion was written was very set & if you were born into a lower class family, you were not seen as anything better than that. Eliza was a lower class flower girl whose speech was not Standard English & difficult to understand. She came from the slum streets of London & was as clean as she could afford to be but to the upper class people she was 'worthless' & 'dirty'. Higgins was an upper class man who studied phonetics. He was written as someone who believed in the class system & that he should not associate with the likes of 'Eliza' who was 'just a flower girl' & a 'disgrace to the English language'.
The play, Pygmalion, by Bernard Shaw is about a phonetics expert who makes a bet that he can pass a Cockney flower girl as a duchess in the matter of a few months. This girl, Eliza does achieve the transformation, but at the expense of a familiar life in the gutters, and risks being caste off into the world with nowhere to turn. This play explores many themes, has extensive use of symbolism, interesting tonality, irony, and the play itself is an allusion to ancient Greek mythology. The major theme in Pygmalion is class. In Britain you are very much judged by your social class.
You see, really and truly, apart from the things anyone can pick up (the dressing and the proper way of speaking, and so on), the difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she 's treated. I shall always be a flower girl to Professor Higgins, because he always treats me as a flower girl, and always will; but I know I can be a lady to you, because you always treat me as a lady, and always will.” This truth from Eliza expands to a patriarchal society. The way women are treated to be inferior is what keeps them inferior, not how women act. Eliza is lucky to have the opportunity to hold herself to a higher image that is given the respect she always deserved. If only all women were not treated like flower girls, and like
Class Distinictions in Pygmalion Pygmalion, by George Bernard Shaw, is a thrilling drama in which a scientist of phonetics tries to transform a cockney speaking Covent Garden flower girl into a woman as poised and well-spoken as a duchess. The play considers some of the illusions of the class distinctions. This is represented by the characters, their situations, and their aphoristic comments. Eliza Doolittle starts out as a sassy, smart-mouthed flower girl with disgraceful English. See goes to see Professor Higgins to see if he will teach her to speak properly and act more like a lady.
Handing out tokens instead of real money demonstrates how the government does not trust Handmaids; they believe these women will use legitimate money to escape Gilead, or rebel by accessing black market goods. With Handmaids associated with reproductive organs, and thought of as vessels for this process, the women wear red to exploit their societal intentions. Being that the color red symbolizes impregnation, it displays the advantage Handmaid’s attain over resentful women in society; this advantage is ironic due to the fact that higher classes in Gilead look down on Handmaids even though... ... middle of paper ... ... pre-Gilead, and is miserable within the society; this unhappiness is due to the fact that she is oppressed, does not have freedom, and cannot feel real love. The phrase wrapping is also symbolic, since it affiliates with the idea of a wrapped present; describing her organ like a red wrapped present establishes how Offred’s only goal is to become pregnant, avoid miscarriage, and carry on her job as a Handmaid. Plus, describing her body part within wrapping connotes the nastiness of men; Offred and other women believe men only desire sexual satisfaction.
They part together for dinner, after Higgins throws a generous handful of coins to the miserable flower girl. The next morning, Higgins is showing Pickering his laboratory when the flower girl arrives at his house. She announces that she want to take English lessons in order to speak well enough to work in a shop. The two phoneticians are shocked but amused by her proposition, and Pickering bets Higgins that he cannot transform the flower girl, Eliza, into a convincing duchess in six months. Higgins decides to take the bet and persuades the ruffled Eliza to agree to it.
Oberon is married to Titania, Queen of the Fairies, who received an Indian boy from her dear friend who passed away. Oberon desperately wants the Indian boy to be one of his followers, but the boy is one of Titania followers and she will not give him up. This is when Oberon decides to use magic, in an attempt to win the Indian boy. Oberon uses the magic of a flower, to make his wife, Titania fall in love with the next creature she sees. Oberon says, “Fetch me that flower; the herb I shew'd thee once: / The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid / Will make or man or woman madly dote / Upon the next live creature that it sees” (2.1.175-178).
When called upon to arrange the hair of her unkind step-sisters for the ball, we are told that "anyone but Cinderella would have dressed their hair awry, but she was good-natured, and arranged it perfectly well" (Classics, 18). After arriving at the ball with the help of a fairy godmother, and winning the affection of the desirable prince, Cinderella "sat down with her sisters showing them a thousand civilities"(Classics, 20). Her rare goodness ... ... middle of paper ... ...igeons pluck out her step-sisters' eyes to repay them for all the evil they brought upon her. Although the heroines in "Aschenputtle" and "Cinderella" both manage to attend the ball and marry the prince despite mistreatment and unreasonable demands, the two versions of the popular fairy tale leave the reader with contrasting feelings. These contrasts can be understood when considering the writers' audiences.
In jest they mentioned their plan to a friend, Petruchio, who surprisingly agreed to marry Katherina. All her beauty and wealth were enough for him. Katherina reluctantly was wed to Petruchio and she was taken to his home to be tamed. With Katherina out of the way, Bianca was now allowed to marry Lucentio, who offered her father the highest dowry for her. In the final scenes of the play, Katherina proves that she is tamed by winning an obedience contest at a dinner party.
It can be considerated an issue of language. This play was written by George Bernard Shaw in 1912, presents a comic Edwardian version of the classical myth about Pygmalion, legendary sculptor and King of Cyprus, who fell in love with his own statue of Aphrodite. At his prayer, Aphrodite brought the statue to life as Galatea. George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion is the story of Henry Higgins, a master phonetician, and his mischievous plot to pass a common flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, off as a duchess at the Embassy Ball. In order to achieve his goal, Higgins must teach Eliza how to speak properly and how to act in upper-class society.