Themes of George Bernard Shaw's Play Pygmalion Pygmalion and My Fair Lady are a modern parallel of the story of 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. The play looks at "middle class morality" and upper-class superficiality, and reflects the social ills of nineteenth century England, and attests that all people are worthy of respect and dignity. Shaw's "Pygmalion" is Henry Higgins, professor of phonetics, who, comes upon a homely flower-girl selling flowers in the streets, makes a wager with Colonel Pickering that in three months he can so transform her as to pass her off for a lady. To Higgins, this is but a task that he accomplishes, a wager that he wins; but in Eliza Doolittle, the flower girl, a new personality has been created. With the manners and speech of a lady, she cannot fall back into her old life, and with those ways has come an asserting will, which selects Henry Higgins, her "creator," as her mate. To Higgins' dismay, he finds that his "laboratory case" has surged into all his life, with emotional entanglements he had not anticipated. Throughout most of civilization, people have been divided into social classes. In a lot of different especially capitalist cultures there is an upper class rich, powerful and in control. Then there was a middle class, less comfortably off than ... ... middle of paper ... ...ian royalty at that, merely by altering her appearance and speech. The wealthy are so superficial they can not see past Eliza's appearance. On a deeper level, Pygmalion addresses the social ills in England at the turn of the century. Victorian England was characterized by extreme class division and limited, to no, social mobility. Language separated the elite from the lower class. In Pygmalion, Eliza's dialect inhibits her from procuring a job in a flower shop; Pygmalion is about the universal truth that all people are worthy of respect and dignity, from the wealthy nobleman to the beggar on the street corner. The difference between a common flower girl and a duchess, apart from appearance and demeanor, is the way she is treated. Treat the flower girl as if she were a duchess, worthy of respect and decency, and she will become a better person as a result.
The points of view in “A&P” and “A Rose for Emily” show the fascination that people have with those in the upper class. Updike writes in the first person point of view. The narrator is Sammy, a cashier at the grocery store. Queenie, who walks around the A&P in only a bathing suit, fascinates him. Updike writes, “She had on a kind of dirty-pink… bathing suit with a little nubble all over it and, what got me, the straps were down.” (Updike, 2). He describes the girls in great detail throughout the story, obviously studying them. This first-person point of view shows the thoughts of Sammy, who is a member of the middle class. His fascination with Queenie is exemplary of the average person’s fascination with the rich. Sammy analyzes Queenie so much that he feels a particular connection to her, thinki...
Another factor in the storyline is society's attitude to class differences. Higher classed people were never allowed to socialise with people below their class. For example, Alice who is a young girl born to a rich high-classed family queries why she cannot marry Thomas, a lower classed boy. This is answered by "'Cos he's not a gentleman." Higher classed people were not permitted to marry out of their class. If they did it would be considered shameful and parents would often disown their children. Another example is, "Never was he more ashamed than when he saw their eyes scan his heavy jacket and breeches, his hob-nailed boots and cotton shirt and these were his best clothes" this is when Thomas visits Alexander's house. Alexander is much higher classed. It shows how he feels to be in the company of those higher classed.
She cared for people. She cared for Miss Lottie. At this moment all she wanted to do was apologize. She felt guilty. The guiltiest she has ever felt in her entire life. She single-handedly ruined the one thing Miss Lottie had a hope for in this world. Lizabeth grew up and realized it in one moment. She looked back on this moment, and talked about how after this year. Miss Lottie never grew marigolds again. But Lizabeth looks back at this time in her life, and she embodies Miss Lottie. Lizabeth then realizes you must look at the beauty in your life, and not the despair. “For one does not have to be ignorant and poor to find that his life is as barren as the dusty yards of our town. And I too have planted marigolds” (Collier 148). In a different period of time, Lizabeth gives back to Miss Lottie, even after she has passed, with a peace offering. Her marigolds. Her marigolds that Lizabeth grew now symbolize the hope that Miss Lottie had in the world in the future. Her marigolds were Miss Lottie’s. Even after her death, Lizabeth uses marigolds to make the legend of Miss Lottie live
Mrs and Miss Bates are genteel people and of genteel birth. They are well educated and well spoken and readily invited into the Woodhouse circle. This high class is illustrated at Boxhill during Mr Knightley’s vehement reprimand of Emma’s cutting remark: ‘she has seen you grow up from a period when her notice of you was an honour.’ Of course, they have since slipped in monetary value, but retain their social position nonetheless. Mrs. Elton has the money, but not the connections or character to be considered genteel. Her marriage to a vicar as Mr Elton has raised her a class, but she has clearly not had the breeding to be comfortable in such high society, as she shows by continually dropping Maple Grove into conversations, and justifying her talents: ‘well, my friends say…’ Harriet Smith obviously is not genteel by birth, being the ‘natural daughter of somebody’ but Emma invents her parentage for the sake of the love games. The original modesty and humility that Harriet enjoys are accentuated and extended under the careful care of Emma. Th...
...ll’s power overtakes the other male characters like Algernon and Jack, who have their own personal unresolved crises in the start, putting them lower down the scale of the social group. There is the idea that Wilde portrays Lady Bracknell as the ideal figure for upper class women that both Gwendolyn and Cecily should aim to rival in the future. However, the playwright already demonstrates how the younger women in the play provide the main source of conflict, as they are the objects of affection, so the notion of the ‘New Woman’ may enable them to surpass the elder women’s, who still own patriarchal values, power in the society. At the same time Wilde is able to criticize the drama that not only the women but the whole of the upper class create from the details of each other’s personal affairs. Wilde’s ultimate point is that comedy reacts against social conformity.
streets of London & was as clean as she could afford to be but to the
People are always in the pursuit of erasing their flaws and becoming what society would say is "perfect." In the play Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw the main character Eliza Doolittle was not content with her life and her lamentable speech and manners. In order to become what she considered "perfect" Eliza relied on Higgins to change her into a proper and sophisticated woman. Higgins pounded lessons of proper speech and how to conduct one 's self with eloquence into Eliza 's head minute after minute and day after day. Although Eliza was being transformed externally, as she continued to grow from her lessons, she also began to transform internally and realize that she deserved respect, whether she was a kerbstone flower girl or a duchess.
The elements that are illustrated within Pygmalion support the theme of language being the distinctions amid the social classes. The characters prove themselves through their speech to belong to their appropriate classes. The transformations are seen from the young girl still in training alongside her already sophisticated mother, and the impact Higgins’ criticism has had on Eliza. The purpose shown within the play is further supported that being educated will result in a new world of opportunities, while it will never change the true self worth of the individual. Conclusively it establishes that social classes themselves are superficial, and to judge on the content of character will always be more important than imagine on the outer surface.
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw is a play that shows a great change in the character Eliza Doolittle. As Eliza lives in poverty, she sells flowers to earn her living. Eliza does not have an education. This shows through the way that she does not have the most proper way of speaking. This happens through when Eliza is speaking to the other characters when she meets then when she is still at a low level of poverty in her life. To understand the reasons Eliza is able to change and be changed into an almost Cinderella like character. With Eliza going from and growing and changing through the hardship she faces. In the play Eliza begins with no confidence and works towards having a way to reach trough from learning during her life experiences. Learning through the other characters Eliza meets through out the play. Eliza grows stronger and shows how she is able to change her ways one can understand how she is able to change and makes these changes by seeing her through poverty, how she is interacting with the other characters in the play, and through the things she learns from the options that are provided to her. Eliza’s beginning education skills of learning to speak clearly through learning diction, etiquette, and looking proper for society. In addition, from how Eliza feels rich when she has money from the broken flowers and when she is able to be riding in the taxi, her ideas showing her strong will her insistence on marrying Freddy. Both Eliza and Cinderella grow up in poverty, have a stepmother figure, have a fairy godmother figure, arrive at the ball, show confidence, and married. By comparing and contrasting Eliza to Cinderella, we can better understand why and how Eliza changes.
“Manners are the happy way of doing things” according to Ralph Waldo Emerson. According to Emerson people use manners as a front to make themselves look better. Inherently, this will lead to a contradiction of the front and the reality. One such man who is most concerned with manners is the protagonist of Shaw’s Pygmalion, Professor Henry Higgins. Higgins is a man who displays contradictions within his character. He is in the business of teaching proper manners, although lacks them himself. In addition, Higgins is an intelligent man, and yet he is ignorant of the feelings of those around him. Another apparent contradiction is that Higgins’ outer charm serves to hide his bullying nature. He manipulates Eliza and others around him to serve his own purposes, without any regard for her feelings.
Pygmalion is one of Bernard Shaw’s most famous and beloved plays, which he published in London in 1912. This play was written during the Edwardian era which was characterised by major political, social and economical changes. Politically, the reign of king Edward VII witnessed a relative involvement of social segments such as labourers and women in political life. Socio-economically, the British society was marked by a strict and a clear-cut social class system in the early twentieth century. During this period and up to First World War, it was believed that 1% of the British population owned approximately 70% of the country’s wealth. As an outcome of the industrialisation and urbanisation processes, however, people increasingly started to get interested in socialist ideas and called for the improvement of women’s position. Given this historical background, Shaw was devoted to write a type of plays different from the Victorian plays which he regarded to be superficial and meaningless. In his view, drama has to be about ideas and conflicts and not about unimportant matters. Thus, Pygmalion can be considered as a social criticism on various topics such as social identity, social class and the power of language. This essay is an attempt to examine the themes of language, social class and gender in Pygmalion. Firstly, a brief summary of the play will be provided. Next, the theme of language and social class will be addressed. The last part will be devoted to the theme of gender and specifically the position of women.
In the play, Pygmalion, Bernard Shaw creates many events that consist of comedy, seriousness, sympathy and empathy. These four emotions helps the audience decide what they feel towards
...y a set of expectations and values that are established on mannerisms and conduct challenged by Elizabeth. From this novel, it is evident that the author wrote it with awareness of the class issues that affect different societies. Her annotations on the fixed social structure are important in giving a solution to the current social issues; that even the class distinctions and restrictions can be negotiated when an individual turns down bogus first impression s.
...t Fielding tends to mock the upper class more and it can be argued they are the ones with worse characteristics however he also ridicules lower class characters such as Mrs. Slipslop, the middle aged plump lady's maid who is also a bully ; Peter Pounce, the swindling skinflint, Mrs. Tow-wouse, the scolding innkeepers wife and Pamela's hypocrisy in the sense she once saw Fanny as her equal but now deems herself to be superior. In conclusion we see that Fielding does not so much then make a distinction between class, but shows us that hypocrisy, vanity, unkindness and cruelty are vices that belong to all members of society and it is only those who see the goodness in humanity and who treat all others with kindness and respect regardless of class that are superior individuals.