Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

CHANAKYA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

LAW AND LITERATURE

FINAL DRAFT ON
PYGMALION BY BERNARD SHAW

SUBMITTED TO - SUBMITTED BY-

Dr. Pratyush kaushik ABHISHEK KUMAR

Roll. No. 1505

Semester :-2nd

Session – 2016-2021

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

TENTATIVE CHAPTERIZATION

Sl. No. Particulars Page No.

1. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 3

2. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 4

4. CHAPTERS: 5-15
1. Introduction
2. Theme
3. Characterization
4. Language and Style
5. Conclusion

6. BIBLIOGRAPHY 16

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Prof. (Dr.) Pratyush kausik, for his
invaluable support, guidance and advice. I would also like to thank my parents who
have always been there to support me. I would also like to thank the library staff
for working long hours to facilitate us with required material going a long way in
quenching our thirst for education.

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

 Whether Doctrinal or Non Doctrinal?

My research is a blend of doctrinal and non-doctrinal research. Doctrinal in the

sense that i have collected theoretical material from different sources such as
text books and Internet resources.

 Whether Primary or Secondary?

Now coming on to whether my research is primary or secondary. Our research

is a totally based on secondary material as it is totally based on Text books,
articles and Internet research (secondary source).

 Analytical or Descriptive?

I have tried to be analytical in writing this project but nevertheless I have

included statistics and important quotes from different sources, as and when
considered suitable.

AIMS & OBJECTIVES

1. Researcher wants to know the writing style of this novel.
2. Researcher wants to know that how it is useful for law student.

Introduction
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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as
Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic and polemicist whose influence on Western
theatre, culture and politics extended from the 1880s to his death and beyond. He wrote more
than sixty plays, including major works such as Man and Superman (1903), Pygmalion (1913)
and Saint Joan (1923). With a range incorporating both contemporary satire and historical
allegory, Shaw became the leading dramatist of his generation. He was the first person to be
awarded both a Nobel Prize and an Academy Award, receiving the 1925 Nobel Prize in
Literature and sharing the 1938 Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for the film
version of Pygmalion.1

Born in Dublin, Shaw moved to London in 1873, where he established himself as a writer and
novelist. By the mid-1880s he was a respected theatre and music critic. Following a political
awakening, he joined the gradualist Fabian Society and became its most prominent pamphleteer.
Shaw had been writing plays for years before his first public success, 1894's Arms and the Man.
Influenced by Henrik Ibsen, he sought to introduce a new realism into English-language drama,
using his plays as vehicles to disseminate his political, social and religious ideas. By the early
twentieth century his reputation as a dramatist was secured with a series of critical and popular
successes that included Major Barbara, The Doctor's Dilemma and Caesar and Cleopatra.

Shaw's expressed views were often contentious: he promoted eugenics and alphabet reform
while opposing vaccination and organised religion. He courted unpopularity by denouncing both
sides in the First World War as equally culpable. He castigated British policy on Ireland in the
postwar period, and became a citizen of the Irish Free State in 1934, maintaining dual
citizenship. He was prolific, finishing during the inter-war years a series of often ambitious plays
which achieved varying degrees of popular success. His appetite for politics and controversy
remained undiminished; by the late 1920s he had largely renounced Fabian gradualism and often
wrote and spoke favourably of dictatorships of the right and left—he expressed admiration for
both Mussolini and Stalin. In the final decade of his life, he made fewer public statements, but
continued to write prolifically until shortly before his death, aged 94, having refused all state
honours, including the Order of Merit in 1946.2

Since Shaw's death, opinion has varied about his works. He has at times been rated as second
only to William Shakespeare among English-language dramatists; analysts recognise his
extensive influence on generations of playwrights. The word "Shavian" has entered the language
as encapsulating Shaw's ideas and his means of expressing them.

1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bernard_Shaw 12/04/17 02:06 am
2
Ibid

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

Pygmalion is a play by George Bernard Shaw, named after a Greek mythological figure. It was
first presented on stage to the public in 1913.

Pygmalion divided in V act. Pygmalion takes place in London, England in the early twentieth
century. At this point, the city was the capital of the largest empire in the world. That said, we
only get a very small glimpse of it. All of the play's action is confined to three places, each
located in the very fashionable center of town: Covent Garden, the laboratory of Henry Higgins's
apartment at 27A Wimpole Street, and the "drawing room" (think living room) of Mrs. Higgins's
apartment on Chelsea embankment. You don't need to know exactly where these places are. Just
know that they're ritzy, about as far away from the poor parts of London you could get.3

Two old gentlemen meet in the rain one night at Covent Garden. Professor Higgins is a scientist
of phonetics, and Colonel Pickering is a linguist of Indian dialects. The first bets the other that he
can, with his knowledge of phonetics, convince high London society that, in a matter of months,
he will be able to transform the cockney speaking Covent Garden flower girl, Eliza Doolittle,
into a woman as poised and well-spoken as a duchess. The next morning, the girl appears at his
laboratory on Wimpole Street to ask for speech lessons, offering to pay a shilling, so that she
may speak properly enough to work in a flower shop. Higgins makes merciless fun of her, but is
seduced by the idea of working his magic on her. Pickering goads him on by agreeing to cover
the costs of the experiment if Higgins can pass Eliza off as a duchess at an ambassador's garden
party. The challenge is taken, and Higgins starts by having his housekeeper bathe Eliza and give
her new clothes. Then Eliza's father Alfred Doolittle comes to demand the return of his daughter,
though his real intention is to hit Higgins up for some money. The professor, amused by
Doolittle's unusual rhetoric, gives him five pounds. On his way out, the dustman fails to
recognize the now clean, pretty flower girl as his daughter.

For a number of months, Higgins trains Eliza to speak properly. Two trials for Eliza follow. The
first occurs at Higgins' mother's home, where Eliza is introduced to the Eynsford Hills, a trio of
mother, daughter, and son. The son Freddy is very attracted to her, and further taken with what
he thinks is her affected "small talk" when she slips into cockney. Mrs. Higgins worries that the
experiment will lead to problems once it is ended, but Higgins and Pickering are too absorbed in
their game to take heed. A second trial, which takes place some months later at an ambassador's
party (and which is not actually staged), is a resounding success. The wager is definitely won,
but Higgins and Pickering are now bored with the project, which causes Eliza to be hurt. She
throws Higgins' slippers at him in a rage because she does not know what is to become of her,
thereby bewildering him. He suggests she marry somebody. She returns him the hired jewellery,
and he accuses her of ingratitude.

3
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_(play)

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

The play was well-received by critics in major cities following its premieres in Vienna, London,
and New York. The initial release in Vienna garnered several reviews describing the show as a
positive departure from Shaw’s usual dry and didactic style. The Broadway premiere in New
York was praised in terms of both plot and acting, described as “a love story with brusque
diffidence and a wealth of humour.” Reviews of the production in London were slightly less
unequivocally positive, with the Telegraph noting that the play was deeply diverting with
interesting mechanical staging, although the critic ultimately found the production somewhat
shallow and overly lengthy.

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2.Theme
In Pygmalion's plot, Higgins, a phonetics expert, makes a friendly bet with his colleague Colonel
Pickering that he can transform the speech and manners of Liza, a common flower girl, and
present her as a lady to fashionable society. He succeeds, but Liza gains independence m the
process, and leaves her former tutor because he is incapable of responding to her needs.

Pygmalion has a tightly-constructed plot, rising conflict, and other qualities of the "well-made
play," a popular form at the time. Shaw, however, revolutionized the English stage by disposing
of other conventions of the well-made play; he discarded its theatrical dependence on prolonging
and then resolving conflict in a sometimes contrived manner for a theater of ideas grounded in
realism. Shaw was greatly influenced by Henrik Ibsen, who he claimed as a forerunner to his
theatre of discussion or ideas. Ibsen's A Doll House...

We hear language in all its forms in Pygmalion: everything from slang and "small talk," to
heartfelt pleas and big talk about soul and poverty. Depending on the situation, and depending on
whom you ask, language can separate or connect people, degrade or elevate, transform or
prevent transformation. Language, we learn, doesn't necessarily need to be "true" to be effective;
it can deceive just as easily as it can reveal the truth. It is, ultimately, what binds Pygmalion
together, and it pays to read carefully; even something as small as a single word can define a
person.

Try on an opinion or two, start a debate, or play the devil’s advocate.

Pygmalion represents Shaw's attempt to not just use words and language to create art and raise
questions, but to force readers to examine the power and purpose of language itself.

Reading Pygmalion, we come to learn that communication is about more than words, and
everything from clothing to accents to physical bearing can affect the way people interact with
each other.

In constructing Pygmalion around the classic rags-to-riches plot, Shaw fools us in the same way
Eliza fools the upper classes. We expect the plot to resolve itself in the conventional way until,
suddenly, we realize that the play we are watching will not resolve itself at all.

In Pygmalion, we observe a society divided, separated by language, education, and wealth. Shaw
gives us a chance to see how that gap can be bridged, both successfully and unsuccessfully. As
he portrays it, London society cannot simply be defined by two terms, "rich" and "poor." Within
each group there are smaller less obvious distinctions, and it is in the middle, in that gray area
between wealth and poverty that many of the most difficult questions arise and from which the
most surprising truths emerge.

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

Pygmalion allows us to observe a society in flux and understand the problems which crop up in
an "age of upstarts."

We hear language in all its forms in Pygmalion: everything from slang and "small talk," to
heartfelt pleas and big talk about soul and poverty. Depending on the situation, and depending on
whom you ask, language can separate or connect people, degrade or elevate, transform or
prevent transformation. Language, we learn, doesn't necessarily need to be "true" to be effective;
it can deceive just as easily as it can reveal the truth. It is, ultimately, what binds Pygmalion
together, and it pays to read carefully; even something as small as a single word can define a
person.

Is beauty only skin deep? Is it in the eye of the beholder? Or is it the consequence of social
circumstances? Shaw's more interested in dealing with the big questions – like that last one –
than with old saws. In Pygmalion, anything from a pair of boots to a bath to an expensive dress
can tell us important stuff about a character, like their place in the world or their state of mind.
They can reveal what might normally be hidden from view, or hide that which might normally be
obvious. So appearances can be deceiving, and the trick is learning how to judge what is true and
what is false. The thing is, it's not an easy skill to pick up.

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

3.Characterization

1. Professor Henry Higgins - Henry Higgins is a professor of phonetics who plays

Pygmalion to Eliza Doolittle's Galatea. He is the author of Higgins' Universal
Alphabet, believes in concepts like visible speech, and uses all manner of recording and
photographic material to document his phonetic subjects, reducing people and their
dialects into what he sees as readily understandable units. He is an unconventional man,
who goes in the opposite direction from the rest of society in most matters. Indeed, he is
impatient with high society, forgetful in his public graces, and poorly considerate of
normal social niceties--the only reason the world has not turned against him is because he
is at heart a good and harmless man. His biggest fault is that he can be a bully.
2. Eliza Doolittle - "She is not at all a romantic figure." So is she introduced in Act I.
Everything about Eliza Doolittle seems to defy any conventional notions we might have
about the romantic heroine. When she is transformed from a sassy, smart-mouthed
kerbstone flower girl with deplorable English, to a (still sassy) regal figure fit to consort
with nobility, it has less to do with her innate qualities as a heroine than with the fairy-
tale aspect of the transformation myth itself. In other words, the character of Eliza
Doolittle comes across as being much more instrumental than fundamental. The real (re-
)making of Eliza Doolittle happens after the ambassador's party, when she decides to
make a statement for her own dignity against Higgins' insensitive treatment. This is when
she becomes, not a duchess, but an independent woman; and this explains why Higgins
begins to see Eliza not as a mill around his neck but as a creature worthy of his
admiration. 4

3. Colonel Pickering - Colonel Pickering, the author of Spoken Sanskrit, is a match for
Higgins (although somewhat less obsessive) in his passion for phonetics. But where
Higgins is a boorish, careless bully, Pickering is always considerate and a genuinely
gentleman. He says little of note in the play, and appears most of all to be a civilized foil
to Higgins' barefoot, absentminded crazy professor. He helps in the Eliza Doolittle
experiment by making a wager of it, saying he will cover the costs of the experiment if
Higgins does indeed make a convincing duchess of her. However, while Higgins only
manages to teach Eliza pronunciations, it is Pickering's thoughtful treatment towards
Eliza that teaches her to respect herself.5

4. Alfred Doolittle - Alfred Doolittle is Eliza's father, an elderly but vigorous dustman who
has had at least six wives and who "seems equally free from fear and conscience." When
he learns that his daughter has entered the home of Henry Higgins, he immediately

4
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pygmalion/characters.html
5
ibid

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 Pygmalion BY Bernard Shaw

pursues to see if he can get some money out of the circumstance. His unique brand of
rhetoric, an unembarrassed, unhypocritical advocation of drink and pleasure (at other
people's expense), is amusing to Higgins. Through Higgins' joking recommendation,
Doolittle becomes a richly endowed lecturer to a moral reform society, transforming him
from lowly dustman to a picture of middle class morality--he becomes miserable.
Throughout, Alfred is a scoundrel who is willing to sell his daughter to make a few
pounds, but he is one of the few unaffected characters in the play, unmasked by
appearance or language. Though scandalous, his speeches are honest. At points, it even
seems that he might be Shaw's voice piece of social criticism (Alfred's proletariat status,
given Shaw's socialist leanings, makes the prospect all the more likely).

5. Mrs. Higgins - Professor Higgins' mother, Mrs. Higgins is a stately lady in her sixties
who sees the Eliza Doolittle experiment as idiocy, and Higgins and Pickering as senseless
children. She is the first and only character to have any qualms about the whole affair.
When her worries prove true, it is to her that all the characters turn. Because no woman
can match up to his mother, Higgins claims, he has no interest in dallying with them. To
observe the mother of Pygmalion (Higgins), who completely understands all of his
failings and inadequacies, is a good contrast to the mythic proportions to which Higgins
builds himself in his self-estimations as a scientist of phonetics and a creator of
duchesses.
6. Freddy Eynsford Hill - Higgins' surmise that Freddy is a fool is probably accurate. In
the opening scene he is a spineless and resourceless lackey to his mother and sister. Later,
he is comically bowled over by Eliza, the half-baked duchess who still speaks cockney.
He becomes lovesick for Eliza, and courts her with letters. At the play's close, Freddy
serves as a young, viable marriage option for Eliza, making the possible path she will
follow unclear to the reader. 6

6
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pygmalion/characters.html

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4.Language and Style

Of Man and Superman, Shaw himself said that he had written "a trumpery story of modern
London life, a life in which . . . the ordinary man's main business is to get means to keep up the
position and habit of a gentleman and the ordinary woman's business is to get married." This
suggests that the play is a comedy of manners replete with farcical elements, a play which
represents no real break in the tradition of the Victorian theater. Indeed the dramatist insisted
early and late that he was not an inventor in dramatic technique. In the play are to be found such
familiar romantic and melodramatic elements as a will, a love triangle, the apparently fallen
woman, and an episode involving capture by brigands. Among the long-lived comic types are the
mother bent on marrying off her daughter; the brash, impertinent servant who knows more than
his master; and such caricatures as that of Malone, the American millionaire. In character
portrayal, he almost always depends upon overstatement, and such exaggeration is strictly in the
tradition of the comic writer and satirist.7

Like many earlier dramatists, including Shakespeare, to say nothing of Shaw's Victorian
predecessors and contemporaries, the dramatist develops situations by means of a series of
misunderstandings, which may be called "mistaken awarenesses." Thus he is able to build up in
each successive act a series of amusing, often exciting climaxes. Early in Act I, for example, the
audience witnesses a Ramsden confident that he is the sole guardian of Ann Whitefield and
determined to see to it that the revolutionist Jack Tanner shall not come near her. Then, when
Jack appears, Ramsden learns that, very much against his will, the younger man is to serve as co-
guardian of the young lady. Dramatic irony of this sort is always satisfying to an audience. In the
same act, the Violet Robinson-Hector Malone subplot gets underway and begins to provide
counterpoint to the main action. Like the main plot, it develops the sex theme and reveals woman
as the dominant partner in the love game. Before her appearance, all believe that Violet has
disgraced herself. Here Shaw develops and sustains one of the finest examples of dramatic irony
in modern drama. The counter-discovery, that is, the correction of mistaken awareness, is
expertly handled: Violet is revealed as a respectable married woman. These situations lend
themselves wonderfully to the development of character. Jack is given the opportunity to voice
his advanced ideas, particularly in contrast to Ramsden, the old-fashioned liberal, when he
protests against his new and unsolicited responsibility, and more particularly when he eloquently
defends Violet, only to be excoriated by the young lady. Nor is all this irrelevant to the main
theme, for it shows both Ann and Violet as young women who, each in her own way, are
determined to get their own ways.8

As the play progresses, Shaw continues to make effective use of dramatic irony. The initial
dialogue between Jack Tanner and Straker lets the audience know that the blissfully ignorant
Tanner is the one marked down as Ann's prey, not young Octavius. Ann enters, unaware that
Jack has received Rhoda's note giving the true reason why the younger sister cannot join Tanner
on the motor trip, and is caught in a lie — firsthand proof that she is absolutely unscrupulous in
her pursuit of the male. Enter Hector Malone. All but Violet are unaware of the fact that he is her

7
www.sparknotes.com/lit/pygmalion/
8
http://www.shmoop.com/pygmalion/summary.html

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husband, and once more Shaw realizes the comic possibilities of the situation, which nicely
balances the earlier one involving Violet. Jack volubly defends Hector and earns only the
American's indignation.

In Act III, Shaw introduces a story element as melodramatic as any to be found in the Victorian
theater. Not only are the protagonist and his chauffeur made captive by brigands in the Spanish
Sierra, but it is revealed that Mendoza, the brigand leader, had been driven to a life of crime
because of unrequited love for a young lady. Coincidence of coincidences, she turns out to be
Louisa Straker, the chauffeur's sister.

Coincidence and mistaken awareness are to be found even in the Don-Juan-in-Hell interlude. The
old crone who makes inquiry to the first soul she meets turns out to be Dona Ana and learns that
she is speaking to her one-time lover and "murderer" of her father.

In Act IV, Malone receives and reads the note Violet had intended for Hector. This is none other
than a variation of the eavesdropping device so common in the popular theater, certainly from
Shakespeare's day forward. Mistaken awareness abounds in this act. Malone believes that his son
is pursuing a married woman and then learns that Hector is Violet's husband. One may note how
this episode also balances the one in the first act. In the main plot, it is Ann's final rejection of
Octavius and Jack's realization that he cannot escape her which provide the best examples of
mistaken awareness and subsequent discoveries.9

But if Man and Superman is "a repertory of old state devices," to use Reuben A. Brower's term,
it is also much more. For one thing, Shaw is a master of inversion. In his play, the Victorian
Womanly Woman as heroine is replaced by the Vital Woman who relentlessly tracks down her
man. He was honest and modest enough to point out that he had not invented the pursuing female
in literature: Shakespeare and many others had anticipated him in drama, and the passionate
pursuing female flourished in non-dramatic narrative of the Ovidian tradition. But as far as
nineteenth-century and particularly Victorian drama was concerned, Shaw was an innovator. If
Barrie did anticipate him in depicting a servant who was more knowledgeable than his master,
Shaw nevertheless, in the character of Henry Straker, made adroit use of just such an inversion.
Comic inversion is again illustrated in the characterization of Mrs. Whitefield. Many a mother in
popular drama had been intent on marrying off her daughter, but where else is one to be found
with the same motive for such intention? Mrs. Whitefield was devoted to Octavius as if he were
a favorite son; one would expect her to welcome him as a son-in-law. But no, Tavy was too nice
a boy to be victimized by Ann, whereas Jack would be a match for her. There are good examples
of Shavian inversions in the Don-Juan-in-Hell interlude also. Hell is the place where one does
nothing but enjoy himself; Heaven is a boring place. Hell is the home of the Seven Deadly
Virtues in whose names most of the world's misery has been caused. The Devil, a would-be
gentleman and democrat, is the one who lauds love and beauty and who wants everyone to be
happy. Don Juan is anything but a condemned sensualist and murderer; he is a high-minded
idealist dedicated to pure reason.

It certainly is not to be assumed that Man and Superman is only a composite of comic reversals,
farcical incidents, and melodrama often involving type characters. As Shaw himself wrote in the
9
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dedicatory epistle, "This pleasantry is not the essence of the play." It remains a comedy and a
philosophy. Yet one can understand why from the first performance, the play has been hailed
even by those who have not the slightest interest in or knowledge of the philosophy. It happens
to be good theater. And if it is filled with talk, talk, and more talk; the talk is dramatic, especially
in the sense that it individualizes and develops the many characters.

Shaw is adept at varying the style of speaking from one character to another. The contrasting
"voices" in the play go far to explain Harley Granville-Barker's instructions to the cast he was
putting through rehearsal: "Do remember, ladies and gentlemen, that this is Italian opera." One
may add to this Shaw's own remark: "My sort of play would be impossible unless I endowed my
characters with powers of self-expression which they would not possess in real life." His success
in individualizing the oral style of his characters may be illustrated by comparing the speeches of
Ramsden and Tanner. The outmoded Ramsden does talk like "a president of highly respectable
men, a chairman among directors, an alderman among counsellors, a mayor among alderman."
Except when scandalized by Tanner's brash remarks, he sounds like the dignified member of
Parliament used to success through the "withdrawal of opposition and the concession of comfort
and precedence and power." In contrast, Jack's style is more like that of the public-park and
street-corner orator. It has an exciting, intense quality appropriate to the man who prided himself
on being an iconoclast and has learned, as Shaw did, that the way to attract attention is to startle
or to shock people. And it is Tanner who is master of the many sallies, jests, epigrams, and
aphorisms in the play. He does not hesitate to call Ramsden "an old man with obsolete ideas" and
Ann "a boa constrictor," or to declare that "morality can go to its father, the Devil." To Octavius,
whose own discourse offers such a marked contrast, he comes out with "perfectly revolting
things sometimes." But they do not revolt the audience — quite the contrary.

Violet, who knows and has gotten exactly what she wants, namely, a rich husband, speaks far
differently from Ann Whitefield. She minces no words; she is always direct, to the point. To the
crushed Jack Tanner who had rushed to her defense, she says tersely: "I hope you will be more
careful in the future of things you say." And to Hector she offers this practical counsel: "You can
be as romantic as you please about love, Hector; but you must not be romantic about money."
Ann, the Vital Woman and Violet's intellectual superior, can and does speak lines completely
appropriate to one posing as the weak, helpless, and completely dutiful daughter. She easily
hoodwinks Granny Ramsden and has led Octavius to believe that she is the ideal Womanly
Woman. When Tanner gloomily admits that he must serve as one of her guardians, she gushes
delightedly: "Then we are all agreed; and my dear father's will is to be carried out. You don't
know what a joy that is to me and my mother!" But alone with Jack and aware that he sees right
through her, her style of discourse changes. She is his match in the wit's combat.10

Man and Superman is operatic in another way. The longer speeches, notably those made by Jack
Tanner, are bravura pieces, comparable to the arias in grand opera. Examples include Tanner's
conceding that he cannot wholly conquer shame, his description of the true artist when he
endeavors to enlighten the lovesick Octavius, his defense of Violet, and his denunciation of the
tyranny of mothers and of the institution of marriage. Don Juan's memorable peroration when he
announces his intention of leaving Hell and going to Heaven provides another good example.

10
http://www.shmoop.com/pygmalion/summary.html

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5.Conclusion
Bernard Shaw's wonderful drama, "Pygmalion", is a play that weaves such an intricate personal
connection from one character to another that the reader is unknowingly drawn in from the very
start. In the final two acts of this play, Shaw brings his tale of a poor, uneducated, common
flower-girl and her transformation into a real lady of court thanks to the tedious training of
Professor Higgins and the financial backing of Col. Pickering. In the end, the audience finally
learns that Eliza, the flower-girl, does win the bet for Prof. Higgins, in that she tricked all the
people at the ball into thinking that she was born into high society. This fact, however, does not
serve as the climax of the play, as one would think. The ultimate climax is reached when Eliza
realizes that Higgins does not truly care about her or her well being, because he so readily
dismisses her and her future as no longer his concern now that his bet is won. At first, the reader
might get the idea that Eliza is asking Higgins for his affectionate/romantic kindness, but we
soon find that she just wants him to show that he has a heart, and has become as attached to her
as a friend and companion as she has to him. 11

The fact that Eliza ends up marrying Freddy Eynsford Hill is both comical and fitting to me. I
felt all along that Eliza would require a fanatical, unconditional love from the man she married,
but the fact that she found it in timid, unassuming Freddy makes me laugh. Eliza is such a
domineering and loud character that it makes perfect, and yet no sense that she falls for Freddy.
It is almost too perfect, however, that Freddy and Eliza are able to get their flower shop up and
running, and are finally able to make a profit from their dreams. These dreams would never have
been reached if not for the support of Col. Pickering, again. 12

11
http://www.shmoop.com/pygmalion/summary.html
12
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pygmalion/summary.html

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Bibliography
Books

Pygmalion by Bernard Shaw

websites
http://www.sparknotes.com

www.shmoop.com

LAW AND LITERATURE 16