Pygmalion

Chauvinism is extreme and unreasoning partisanship representing a group to which one belongs, including malice and hatred towards a rival group. Male chauvinism is an expression used among feminist for powerful men considered to be superior to females and other social classes. In Pygmalion, Eliza, a cockney flower girl, was selling flowers in the street when Higgins, a phonetics expert, was noting down her accent as Colonel Pickering, a wealthy expert in Indian dialect, was watching. Eliza goes to Higgins' house and asks him to teach her how to speak proper English to become a descent lady and open her own florist shop. The two phoneticians were overwhelmed with the idea and Pickering bet Higgins that he couldn't accomplish this task within six months. Eliza's father Alfred Doolittle, a poor dustman, appears and bargains for some money in return for his daughter's stay in Higgins' house. Higgins agrees and Eliza starts her lessons for the next six months learning about language from Higgins and manners from Pickering who treated her with respect unlike Higgins who always referred to her as his product and his experiment. Eliza proved that she was an intelligent woman with a fine ear. She succeeded in her first trial at Higgins' mother's house and then, at the end of the six- months period, she fascinated everyone with her speech at an Embassy ball. The Ambassador's wife praised her along with the rest of the guests who were also taken by her beauty and thought by Nepomuuck, Higgins' former student, to be a Hungarian princess. Later, Higgins insults Eliza by claiming that this task was boring to him. Eliza felt unappreciated and burst in Higgins' face after throwing him with his slippers. Both of them leave the room angrily. She packs her things and leaves to his mother's house after she's realized that Higgins would always consider her as a flower girl. Eliza's disappearance scared Higgins and made him rush to his mother's house looking for her. Eliza reveals herself and reconciles with him after confronting him with his arrogance and proving herself to be no inferior to him. Eliza decides not to go back to her previous life and opens her own florist shop supported with Pickering's financial aid, after marrying Freddy who loved her for herself. The play is an ideal criticism of the English Society in the early 20th century. The writer combined the position of the different social classes: upper educated class (Higgins, Pickering, and Mrs. Higgins a refined, independent woman, who never gave up in reforming Higgin's social behavior), middle limited education class (Clara an unbearable daughter who's disrespectful to others even to her mother, Freddy Eliza's lover who's accustomed to his lifestyle unlike his sister Clara, and their mother Mrs. Eynsford Hill a former upper class lady), and uneducated lower class(Eliza, Alfred, and Mrs. Pearce Higgin's servant who tries to protect Eliza from Higgin's attitude). Shaw wanted to convey a sense of inflexible society class composition that couldn't be interfered with, unless a person has the capacity and the will like Eliza who broke the rules and changed from a lower class flower girl to a refine duchess. In the play, Higgins was the selfish, powerful character due to his social class, gender, and intellectuality. He acted as a superior man and bullied everyone with his disrespectful speech and manners as it's his natural behavior [pg.99 "the great secret is not having bad manners….having the same manner for all human souls"]. He didn't have any respect to social classes less than his [pg.58 'what the devil are we going to talk about….comes''] or to women except for his mom who was his ideal woman. [pg.37 "Have you ever met a man of good character where women are concerned'] .He classified people by their accent and differentiated them geographically and socially; audible accent means an upper class, bad accent means a poor class. Shaw also introduces the unequal relations between men and women in the English society. At that time, women in Britain were disfranchised and had limited opportunities for education and employment. They were considered inferior to men and as one of their properties, [Doolittle pg.45 'if you want the girl, I'm not so set on having her back …but I might be open to an arrangement']. Marriage was considered as a trade of sexuality for money same as prostitution and that women were born for the joy of men. The idea of a working female was not tolerable, her role in life was to be a good housewife aside from being a prostitute. When Eliza first shows up asking Higgins for English lessons, he treated her very impolitely and insolently[pg.26 'shall we ask this baggage to sit down'",pg. 36 "you can't be a nice girl inside if you're a dirty slut outside"] and ordered her to obey his commands [pg.28 'Sit down!",] and when she cried he showed no compassion [pg.36 "stop crying and go back into your room and change your clothes"]. He neglected her as a person who had feelings[pg.29 ..wrap her up in brown paper"] Pickering objected by showing some sympathy with Eliza [pg.32 "Does it occur to you, Higgins, that the girl has some feelings']. As the play continues, the big transformation that Eliza had witnessed in her personality and speech did not stop Higgins from bullying her verbally[pg.104 'you damned impudent slut"] although deep down his attitude changed from what it was at the beginning of the play. On the other hand, Eliza proved that she was a good and powerful woman with her resistance to Higgins' abuse and a very smart one. She was a quick learner beyond everyone's expectations and succeeded in becoming a respectful lady. Despite her suffer from Higgins' mistreatment, she never gave up and knew that acquiring self-control is her key to success. She attacks Higgins methods by admiring Pickering who's always treated her with respect [pg.95 'you're calling me Miss Doolittle that day…the beginning of self-respect'.] which had a strong impact on her transformation. Pickering always referred to her as 'Miss Doolittle', whilst Higgins called her 'Eliza' right from the beginning besides 'this baggage', 'presumptuous', and 'insect'. She was able to free herself from his domination by challenging him to become an assistant to a phonetician teacher, Nepomuuck, whom Higgins resents[pg. 104 'Now I know how to deal with you….I had only to lift up my finger to be as good as you] and marrying Freddy [pg.104 'Freddy loves me: that's make him king enough for me']. Although Higgins loved the recent new Eliza who in her turn shared him the same feelings, she was reasonable enough to realize that their marriage will not survive since he'll always look down at her as a flower girl [pg.104"I said I'll make a woman of you and I have. I like you this way"]. Shaw rejected the principles of his days and expressed it through 'Pygmalion'. He supported women's liberty and renounced the male chauvinism of his time and Shakespeare's. He criticized Shakespeare's drama "The Taming of the Shrew" which was based on violent and insolent behavior to women. The end of both plays was a message for society to reject male dominance over women and limit social class discrimination. References Chauvinism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Internet. Database available online. Internet en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chauvinism - 36k - Date accessed May 15, 2009 Male Chauvinist Pig - Glossary Internet. Database available online. Internet. womenshistory.about.com/cs/60s70s/g/gl_mcp.htm - 21k Date accessed May 15, 2009 Pygmalion Book Notes Summary by George Bernard Shaw Book Notes Summary Internet. Database available online. Internet. www.bookrags.com/notes/pyg/ - 30k Date accessed May 15, 2009 Bernard Shaw, Pygmalion, Penguin Books Ltd, Copyright The Public Trustee as Executor of the Estate of George Bernard Shaw,1957