Pygmalion

Why did Shaw write Pygmalion?

Shaw decided to make an example of how the English (don’t) speak their own language. The writer's criticism is that while other languages are phonetic, (the speaker can speak it as it is written), English is not (English spelling is notoriously non-phonetic: seeing a word spelt will not automatically show you how to pronounce it).

Shaw wanted to comment on the social divisions that classed people based on how they spoke. He believed the English language and spelling should be simplified and made more egalitarian: if it was easier to spell, it would be easier for children to learn across all levels and would, he felt, lead to a more equal society. His play Pygmalion is social commentary set within a comedy of manners:

(G.B.Shaw, Preface to Pygmalion, 1912)

There were several phoneticists around, but Shaw thought Sweet had the right characteristics to serve as a (partial) model for Higgins:

(G.B.Shaw, Preface to Pygmalion, 1912)

He also wanted to show people that they need not be confined by their own expectations or other people's:

(G.B.Shaw, Preface to Pygmalion, 1912)

Pygmalion: characters

Henry Higgins: Higgins is partly based on a real-life phonologist and linguist Henry Sweet:

It is possible that Higgins is also partly based on the charismatic music and singing teacher from Shaw’s childhood, Vanderleur Lee, of whom it has been speculated that he was Shaw's natural father.

In the play, Higgins is quite autocratic and cheerfully rude to people; he likes his own way, and often behaves like a spoilt child (or as Shaw describes him: ‘rather like an impetuous baby’). His mother has clearly indulged him, but he has grown used to his independence. He is ‘of the energetic, scientific type’ (Shaw), totally absorbed in his subject: phonetics, accents, and in fact everything connected to language. The fact that Eliza is a living human being with feelings never occurs to him:

In fact, he treats her as if she were a statue, though not like Galatea in Ovid’s tale.

He is, however ‘so entirely frank and void of malice that he remains likeable even in his least reasonable moments.’ (Shaw)

• Eliza Doolittle: a flower seller who works in the Covent Garden area. Her dream is to one day open a flower shop. She is quick-tongued and quick-witted but impeded from moving up in life because of the way she speaks.

• Captain Pickering: Higgins's friend and fellow linguist, who has made a wager with Higgins that he cannot teach Eliza to talk like a Duchess in 6 months. He is a kindly soul, who is concerned for Eliza’s welfare and tries to remonstrate with Higgins when he behaves particularly insensitively.

• Mrs Pearce: Higgins’s housekeeper: matronly, long-suffering, and kindly.

• Alfred Doolittle: Eliza’s father. A philosopher, a drinker, and dustman who, once Eliza is made an object of worth, becomes entirely amenable to the opportunity.

• Mrs Higgins: Higgins’s mother, whom he adores, and who is rich, intelligent, dignified, and possessing a cultivated sense of fine art. She also knows exactly what Higgins is like and constantly has to reprimand him.

• Freddy Eynsford Hill is the son of a friend of Higgins's mother; he doesn’t have much brains, so Eliza can boss him around to her heart’s content (and probably will). He is good-natured and full of admiration for Eliza, and that is the main purpose of his role: to act as a fall-back, or support, for her.

Pygmalion: summary

Let's look at the brief summary of the Pygmalion by shaw.

Acts in Pygmalion

Act wise summary of the Pygmalion, has been summarised in different acts which are as follows:

ACT 1

Pygmalion opens on a rainy night in Covent Garden, London. There has been a play performed at the theatre and people are flocking out, looking for cabs. Several people are taking shelter under a portico

Freddy is looking for a cab for his mother and sister.

Eliza is trying to sell flowers, only people are in a hurry, including Freddy, who pushes past, knocking her flowers from her hand and trampling them by accident. He apologises and rushes off; Eliza laments his lack of manners and Freddy’s mother pays for the spoiled flowers.

Captain Pickering appears and Eliza tries to sell him flowers but he only has 3 halfpennies to give her. One of the bystanders points out to Eliza:

Eliza kicks up a fuss, accusing Higgins of being an undercover policemen and talking herself into a state. Higgins tells her to be quiet, and explains at large what he does:

Pickering introduces himself as a student of Indian dialects. The two arrange to meet for dinner. Eliza tries again to get some money from Pickering (as she’s short for her lodging). Pickering still has no change and leaves. Higgins, who's heard her earlier, accuses her of lying. Eliza, in a fit of pique, throws her basket on the ground :

Eliza goes home in a cab.

ACT 2

Next day.

Higgins has been demonstrating his equipment to Colonel Pickering; they are interrupted by the arrival of Eliza, who demands to be taught to speak ‘more genteel’ so she can get somewhere in life. She offers to pay with the money Higgins gave her the night before.

Higgins, struck by the opportunity to study her accent, agrees to a wager with Colonel Pickering:

Higgins, excited by the challenge, accepts:

Eliza is removed by Mrs Pearce under instructions to wash her, burn her clothes, and get her new ones.

A new visitor is announced: Eliza’s father, Alfred Doolittle. He has come about Eliza, and Higgins assumes he has come to take her away.

Eliza comes in, clean, in a blue Japanese kimono. Doolittle fails to recognise her at first; Eliza explains to Higgins that her father only came to get money out of him for drink. Doolittle tells Higgins he can try to improve Eliza’s mind if he wants to and promises to visit her. Higgins gives Doolittle 5 pounds on the condition that she can stay.

Eliza’s new clothes arrive, and she rushes off to try them on, followed by Mrs Pearce.

Higgins and Pickering agree that they have ‘taken on a stiff job’.

ACT 3

Social activities were arranged around visits to people’s homes, as well as going to exhibitions, galleries and theatre.

Shaw is very detailed and specific in his description of what one sees on stage; Mrs Higgins' drawing-room is styled on the Arts and Crafts Movement: uncluttered, with Burne Jones prints, William Morris fabrics, and Chippendale furniture.

Mrs. Higgins is writing at a table when her son Henry arrives. He begins boasting about how much he has taught Eliza and wants to try her out at one of his mother’s homes. Immediately. Just as Higgins is explaining about Eliza, the guests are announced: Mrs and Miss Eynsford Hill, followed by Freddy (Eynsford Hill).

Eliza is announced and astounds everyone with her perfect pronunciation, combined with her unorthodox figures of speech.

When asked about the weather:

Or when people start discussing health:

By changing the accent of Eliza, Shaw impishly orchestrates a satirical comedy of manners: Mrs Higgins’ guests have no idea of Eliza’s origins, but because she sounds like them, they imagine she is speaking the ‘new small talk’. As Freddy says: ‘You do it so awfully well.’

Higgins coughs and looks at his watch as a signal for Eliza to leave, which she does in style. When Freddy asks if she will be walking, she replies:

Freddy’s sister Clara convinced this is the latest fashion, copies her with Higgins' encouragement:

After the visitors have left, Higgins asks his mother what she thinks of Eliza. Mrs. Higgins explains that Eliza will hardly be suited at a garden party because of the language Higgins keeps using. Higgins continues to describe how busy they are with Eliza, teaching and training her. At this point Shaw alludes to the Pygmalion myth:

She attempts to make Henry understand:

Higgins and Pickering do not see any problem, Pickering suggests there are plenty of openings in employment. They leave Mrs HIggins gripping her writing-table, saying ‘Oh!! Men, men, men!!!’

ACT IV

Higgins, Pickering, and Eliza return from a ball, where Eliza has been passed off as an aristocrat. Eliza is subdued, exhausted.

Higgins and Pickering spend some time congratulating each other on the evening’s success; ignoring Eliza. Eliza tolerates it until after Pickering has left for bed; Higgins tells her to switch off the lights and leaves the room to look for his slippers.

Eliza gets as far as the lights, then throws herself on the floor in a tantrum, and throws his slippers at him.

When he demands an explanation she tells him:

At first, Higgins simply suggests she will have plenty of opportunities and suggests she have a good night’s sleep. Eliza stares at him speechless. Higgins then suggests she will find someone to marry -

They argue, and Eliza returns the jewellery she was wearing, including the ring Higgins once bought for her. Higgins dashes the ring on the floor and leaves for bed in high dudgeon; Eliza triumphs, then crouches down looking for the ring.

ACT V

We return to Mrs Higgins at the writing table in her drawing room. Higgins and Pickering come in, panic-stricken that they cannot find Eliza. Mrs Higgins suggests they frightened her. Eliza’s father arrives, dressed as a gentleman. He berates Higgins, accusing him of ruining Doolittle, by tying him up and delivering him ‘into the hands of middle-class morality’.

It turns out that Higgins had written to an eccentric millionaire in America about Doolittle, and as a result, Doolittle inherited the millionaire’s fortune. As a result, Doolittle has begun to discover the horrors of middle-class society:

Higgin is dressed to be married to Eliza’s current stepmother.

It seems that Doolittle can now look after Eliza’s future, only Higgins says she is not Doolittle’s any longer as Higgins gave him 5 pounds for her. Mrs Higgins reproves Higgins and tells him that Eliza is upstairs.

Doolittle withdraws; finally, Eliza comes in with her workbasket, very much at home. She chats with Colonel Pickering and reminds him how she learned nice manners from him. She also cannot unlearn all that she has learned: she is now a foreigner in the place she was brought up in:

Doolittle comes back in and invites everyone to his wedding. Everyone leaves except for Higgins and Eliza who come to an ambiguous reconciliation. Mrs Higgins pops back in to make sure they are on their way to the wedding. Higgins orders Eliza to buy him some gloves and a tie. Eliza tells him to buy them himself and leaves. Mrs Higgins offers to buy them for him, but Higgins says:

Shaw deliberately left the ending open; all stage action ends with Higgins chuckling to himself. In the play’s published form, Shaw continues the story in a novelesque sequel, describing the future of the various characters. Eliza marries Freddy, and with the Colonel’s help they open a flower shop; Eliza continues to ‘meddle in the housekeeping at Wimpole Street in spite of the shop and her own family.’

However, she dreams sometimes of getting Higgins on a desert island ‘away from all ties and with nobody else in the world to consider, and just drag him off his pedestal and see him making love like any common man.’

Ultimately, though she loves Freddy and Colonel Pickering, she does not like her father or Higgins:

Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824-1904).

What is Pygmalion about?

The play has no real definite ending: Shaw offers an explanation at the end as to what he thinks will happen.

A part of Pygmalion is based on Shaw’s personal life at the time of writing. Although married to Charlotte Payne-Townshend, theirs was an open marriage based on companionship. Charlotte was fond of travelling and continued to do so after her marriage, leaving Bernard free to have affairs with other women.

At the time of writing Pygmalion, Bernard was developing a relationship with Stella Campbell, a young actress performing the part of Eliza. A part of the play’s ambiguous ending may reflect the emotional uncertainties that Stella was bringing into his life.

Pygmalion: themes

Transformation

Higgins ‘transforms’ Eliza from a flower girl to a duchess. He does this by training her to sound like an aristocrat. Shaw’s underlying comment throughout is how appearances can be deceptive. Eliza can be trained to sound educated, and based on this, she can work in a flower shop or one day even follow her dream and open a flower shop.

Social commentary also underpins the text with the notion that nothing actually separates a duchess from a flower girl other than the way they speak.

Social attitudes and conventions

Shaw was a staunch supporter of Fabian socialism, which encouraged equality for all. For Shaw, this included equality in speech. Shaw was an advocate of simplifying the English language and making it phonetic (spelling it as it sounds, saying it how it is spelt). Pygmalion is not only about transformation, it is also about how people perceive status and what that perception is based on: how you speak and how you dress.

During Mrs Higgins's 'at-home day', Higgins wants to test Eliza out on the other visitors.

Eliza has the right voice for society but the wrong expressions. Because she sounds like one of them, the other guests accept Higgins' claim that her expressions are part of the 'new talk' and therefore the height of fashion. This is not unlike the Emperor's new clothes: a prank played on the vain and fashion-conscious to try out invisible clothes.

The fairy tale

Pygmalion is also a princess/rags-to-riches fairy-tale: Eliza starts off as Cinderella, poor, ragged, with neglectful parents and even a stepmother thrown in for good measure (although she never appears). Higgins and Pickering wave their magic wands and Eliza is transformed into a duchess: beautiful clothes, high society, and even a ball. But where is Prince Charming? Is he Freddy, who is weak and rather pathetic? Or is he Higgins, who matches her in energy and intelligence, and who ultimately gives her independence?

Pygmalion: literary devices

Allegory

Shaw's play Pygmalion is an allegory of the legend of a sculptor who carved a woman out of ivory. The king fell in love with his own creation. Venus took pity on him and turned the statue into a real woman. The legend is about loneliness, love, and transformation.

Shaw took the legend and interpreted it in modern terms: Higgins, an expert, or 'sculptor' of phonetics, has the power to transform Eliza from flower girl to duchess, by teaching her speech and changing the way she dresses. The play is a satire, and, instead of the statue turning into a woman, we have a human who is treated almost like a statue, as Higgins does not regard Eliza's feelings.

This failure is not through cruelty (he is in fact a generous, cheerful character) but through carelessness and lack of thought. Shaw turns the legend on its head, and also shows what can really happen when a dream (Eliza's) becomes reality.

By the time the play ends, the audience has discovered the depth of feeling between mentor and student, man and woman, scientist and flower girl. Has the creator fallen in love with his own creation? Or Galatea with the creator? The last word rests with Higgins: Shaw leaves the ending tantalisingly open, allowing the audience to make its own mind up.

The cliffhanger

By leaving the play open-ended, Shaw creates a cliffhanger:

The open ending of Pygmalion did not please everyone; critics were divided on whether the ending worked or not. Some were convinced Eliza was about to run off to Freddy, which didn't make dramatic sense to them. Some were convinced Eliza would marry Higgins. Others felt that Shaw had written the right ending after all.