Pygmalion
George Bernard Shaw (1913)
“A phonetics professor bets he can pass a Cockney flower girl off as a duchess — and discovers that creating a new person is easier than taking responsibility for her.”
At a Glance
Professor Henry Higgins, an arrogant phonetician, wagers Colonel Pickering that he can transform Eliza Doolittle — a Cockney flower girl — into someone who can pass for a duchess at an ambassador's garden party, simply by teaching her to speak 'properly.' He succeeds, but Eliza gains far more than pronunciation: she acquires self-awareness, dignity, and the courage to reject Higgins's assumption that she is his creation. Shaw's play ends not with a romance but with Eliza walking out, choosing independence over gratitude.
Read full summary →Why This Book Matters
Pygmalion is the most commercially successful play Shaw ever wrote, though its commercial success came partly through adaptations that betrayed his intentions. The 1914 London premiere was a sensation — partly for the play's ideas, partly for Mrs. Patrick Campbell's delivery of 'Not bloody likely,' which caused an uproar in the press. The play has been adapted into the 1938 film (which Shaw co-wrote, winning an Oscar), the 1956 musical My Fair Lady (which Shaw would have detested), and countless stage revivals worldwide.
Diction Profile
Formal dialogue for upper-class characters, phonetically rendered Cockney for Eliza's early speech, and Shaw's characteristically argumentative stage directions
Low compared to novelistic prose