Bernard ShawS Pygmalion Essay Research Paper An

Bernard Shaw?S Pygmalion Essay, Research Paper

An interpretation of Class Relations in Pygmalion by, Bernard Shaw

In Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, there is a distinct variance in class relations and the way that early 20th century Britains were perceived as being different by their speech, money, wealth, style, manners, and appearance. Being a lady or a gentleman was an acquired status desirable among most of London’s society. However, in Pygmalion, Shaw tells a story about the transition of a homeless young woman with the aspiration to become a respected lady.

Eliza Doolittle is an 18 or 19 year-old young women, making a living from selling old flowers on the streets. When she comes across a rude Professor, named Henry Higgins, he sarcastically offers her to “learn how to speak beautifully, like a lady in a florist’s shop…..at the end of six months you shall go to Buckingham palace in a carriage, beautifully dressed.” This is what he proposes to Eliza when she comes to ask for English lessons from the Professor. He then makes a bet with another man, Colonel Pickering, who says he will pay for her new clothes and English lessons, if Higgins can make a lady out of her in six months. The deal is made, and Eliza is immediately washed up and put into new, clean clothes. The play begins like this, which sets the plot for the rest of the story.

An example of modern day class relations with speech can be described by linguistic anthropologists, and in an article called “Suite for Ebony and Phonics” by John R. Rickford. In this article, he discusses the African-American speech Ebonics, and the negative impact it has across America. Being called “lazy English,” “bastardized English,” and “poor grammar,” it seems to be the same thing that was going on in England during the time Pygmalion was written. I’m sure that if we were to ask Henry Higgins if that is what he thought about the way Eliza spoke he would whole-heartedly agree. However, the poor English that Eliza spoke was never considered as becoming a legal language in England.

The play begins off on a rainy night on the streets, with a lady and her daughter waiting for a cab. In this first act, Eliza asks them to buy a flower from her, with the response from the daughter, “Do nothing of the sort, mother. The idea!” When the mother gives her some change, the daughter again exclaims, “Make her give you the change. These things are only a penny a bunch … ……sixpence thrown away! Really, mamma, you might have spared Freddy that.” She then retreats disgusted and unable to believe that her mother had actually given in to the poor flower girl. Another example is when Eliza goes to get in the taxi and the driver is trying to keep her out, assuming that she has no money to pay for the ride.

When Higgins meets Eliza, he comes across as very rude, saying:

“Woman; cease the detestable boohooing instantly; or else seek the shelter of some other place of worship……A woman who utters such depressing and disgusting sounds has no right to be anywhere – no right to live…. this creature with her kerbstone English: the English that will keep her in the gutter till the end of her days…Well sir, in three months I could pass that girl off as a duchess at an ambassador’s garden party…..”

He then goes on to call her names like “squashed cabbage leaf” ; “disgrace to the noble architecture of these columns” and an “incarnate insult to the English language”. With obviously no respect for the poor girl, he would say anything that he wants to her, with no spare to her feelings at all.

An example related to this scenario can be compared to “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”, by Peggy McIntosh. In this article, she describes how gender, race and sexual preference are a problem in America. In this case, however, it is more a subcultural problem, but it is related to the way classes differ. She discusses how white people, males particularly, have “skin color that was an asset for any move one was educated to want to make”. In her case, she thinks that most people don’t realize that they are segregating against minorities or sex.

White people have more of an advantage in our society, but it is kept as something people do not discuss, as is male advantage, with the myth that “democratic choice is equally available to all.” Oppressiveness in the United States seems to be unconscious, therefore, it is hard to put an end to it. Like in Pygmalion, class relations were part of their culture, and poor people were always looked down upon.

Even though you may expect such a well-educated man such as Higgins to be a gentleman, he is far from it. He believes that how you treated someone is not important as long as you treat everyone equally. His great secret is not to have good or bad manners but to have the same manner as all human souls. To behave as if you were in Heaven, with no third or first class, and where one soul is as good as the next, with no recognition of any personal assets. He is consistently rude to many, but is also well mannered at parties and in good times.

Mrs. Pearce, his maid, treats the girl like scum when she first meets her, saying, “It’s no use talking to her like that, Mr. Higgins: she doesn’t understand you…. you must call me Mrs. Pearce not missus…..” Also, when Mrs. Pearce is showing her the bathroom, Eliza has no clue what the bath is