Eliza And Mrs Higgins example essay topic

George Bernard Shaw is known by many as the most significant English playwright since the seventeenth century. He wrote fifty-seven plays in his lifetime, and a vast majority of them were revolutionary in their themes. On July 26, 1856, George Bernard Shaw was born in Dublin, Ireland. Shaw was the first son of his parents, George and Lucille, but had two sisters upon his arrival. Although they lived in Ireland, the Shaw were Protestants and George Bernard was baptized in the Church of England; however, he was never very religious and never enjoyed attending church.

He also did not care much for his formal education, even though he attended many different schools. He started his schooling at the Wesleyan Connexion al School and ended his fifteenth year at the Dublin English Scientific and Commercial Day School. Overall, Shaw's childhood was an unhappy one. By the age of fifteen, his parents had split up. His mom deserted her husband and left for England to live with her two daughters.

In order to support himself, Shaw left school and got a job working as a clerk and cashier for a firm of land agents for nearly found and a half years. During this time, George Bernard took it upon himself to read and visit the theatre as much as possible. At the age of nineteen, Shaw's sister Agnes died from food poisoning. Saddened by her death, Shaw left London to live with his mother and sister Lucy in hope of becoming a musician or painter. Being the shy young man that he was, he could not find a place in the arts community there. At the age of twenty-four, Shaw decided to establish himself as a writer.

When newspapers and magazines repeatedly rejected his articles, he then decided to become a novelist. Although all publishers rejected his first novel, Shaw continued to write and produced four more novels between 1880 and 1883; he found no publisher for any of them. Finally, in 1886, Shaw's first novel, Cashel Byron's Profession was published. This novel was very popular, but after publishing his second novel, An Unsocial Socialist, his novel writing career came to an end. Shaw finally found his specialty around 1885 when William Archer suggested that he became a playwright. The play he is most well known for is Pygmalion.

It is a classic play that comes from an ancient myth in which a statue is made of an ideal woman, and by prayer to the gods she is brought to life. George Bernard Shaw took this concept and added his own comical twist to it. Before you can get a realistic picture of how the play develops, you must first be introduced to the characters. Eliza Doolittle is the central figure in the play because it is her that starts out as a poor, ragged, flower girl and is transformed into a fine, well spoken, English women. In the beginning she wanted nothing more than to fit the description of a duchess, but as the play develops she learns that social status is far less important than being in touch with your own identity.

Professor Higgins plays a very important role in the play. He is the one who reforms and teaches Eliza the proper way to talk a how to carry yourself. Higgins is a very educated man who is a professor in phonetics and very enthusiastic in what he does. He is the author of a speech book and very popular in the London area. Mrs., Higgins, Professor Higgins' mother, is a very well mannered intelligent person. She is the mother figure of the characters and is looked upon for advice on more than one occasion.

Colonel Pickering is also very interested in the art of speech. His good manners assisted Higgins in transforming Eliza by expressing a kindness of heart that she wasn't accustomed to on the streets of London. Pickering is also in on the bet, opposing that Higgins' experiment will be a success. The play is set in London in the early 1900's. Act one of the play starts with a varied group of people finding shelter from the rain under the roof of St. Paul's Church in Covent Garden. The group of people includes a lady, her daughter and son, Professor Higgins, Colonel Pickering, Eliza Doolittle, and other bystanders.

While waiting for the downpour to stop, Higgins jots down notes of the accent of the flower girl (Eliza). One of the bystanders sees Higgins taking these notes and suspects him of being an undercover cop. After being warned of these suspicions, Eliza screams that she has done nothing wrong and questions his actions. Higgins explains to the group of people that he can place any person within two miles of London just by the way that person talks.

After Higgins proves his talents by guessing the hometowns of many of the bystanders, the rain stops, and he is left standing there with only Colonel Pickering and Eliza the flower girl. Higgins proceeds to tell Pickering that he is a phonetician (professional of sound) and can not only teach every dialect, but also how to speak it perfectly. Professor Higgins claims that he can transform the flower girl in to a duchess and maybe some day she can have a job as a shop assistant. After talking for a while, Pickering and Higgins find out that they are actually looking for each other and after giving the poor girl some money, they leave together.

The second act of the play starts out at professor Higgins' laboratory. As he and Pickering are sitting down talking, Higgins' housekeeper, Mrs. Pearce informs the men that a flower girl has come to the door and would like to see Professor Higgins. The girl introduces herself and says that she would like to work in a flower shop some day, but in order to do so, she must learn to speak more ladylike. Higgins thinks of the girl as a perfect experiment and makes a promise to Pickering that he will make a duchess out of this girl within the next six months. After Mrs. Pearce take's the girl up to bathe, Eliza's father, Mr. Doolittle arrives and asks for five pounds as the price for his daughter.

Upon opening the door to leave, Mr. Doolittle does not even recognize her when he walked past his clean and newly dressed daughter. The two Doolittle's get in a fight before he leaves. The second act ends with a short teaching lesson on pronunciation. Act three begins at Higgins' mother's house. There have been many teaching sessions since this time, and Professor Higgins is using his mother's at-home day as the first social gathering for Eliza to attend. Some of the guests enter the house, and before long Miss Doolittle is announced and enters the room very nicely dressed.

While talking to the others. Eliza does not follow the subject topics she was supposed to, and the conversation soon turns into a nightmare. After a little hint from Higgins, Eliza announces that it is time for her to go. Freddy, one of the people dodging rain in the first scene, offers to walk Eliza home but she insists on taking a cab. After all of the guests leave, Pickering and Higgins discuss Eliza's progress with Mrs. Higgins.

They all decide that she must receive more training before she can be accepted as a true English woman. After several months of practice and preparation, Eliza's social appearance as a duchess is finally brought forth. This takes place at an embassy in London where many royalties are present. Everybody is impressed with her, and the hostess is even convinced that she is some type of royalty. This act ends with Colonel Pickering congratulating Eliza for winning Higgins' bet for him as though he had done no work himself.

Act four begins at midnight in Higgins' laboratory. Higgins, Pickering, and Eliza have just returned from the successful embassy party. Eliza sits speechless as the two men talk about the relief felt now that the whole situation is over. Not caring what Eliza might think, Higgins tells Pickering that the project was stupid and he would have put a stop to it a lot sooner if he hadn't bet on it. After Pickering goes to bed, Eliza becomes furious with Higgins and throws his slippers toward his head demanding an explanation of why he even picked her up in the first place. She is very worried about her future and what she will end up doing now that the experiment is over.

She is deeply hurt because she had fallen in love with Higgins over this time period, and she is nothing to him but an experiment. After giving up the ring which Higgins had given her, Eliza changes clothes and leaves. She meets Freddy and kisses him in search for comfort. The two then take a taxi, and the scene ends with Eliza expressing that she must call Mrs. Higgins in the morning for some advice. The fifth and final act starts with Higgins arriving at his mother's house to tell her that Eliza has run away not knowing that Eliza had gone to her for help. No more than a few minutes later, Mr. Doolittle arrives and accuses Higgins of forcing him into middle class morality.

He goes on to say that he has been left three thousand pounds a year by an American Language fanatic and that Higgins is the one that gave his name out. He stresses that he has lost his freedom and is unable to live the life he wanted. Soon Eliza enters the room and tried to immediately irritate Higgins by telling Colonel Pickering that it was his good manner and kindness that made her what she was and not Higgins teaching her how to speak right. After Mr. Doolittle leaves to marry the woman he has lived with as Eliza's stepmother, Higgins and Eliza are finally alone together.

At this point, Higgins does everything but beg Eliza to come back and live with him because he has become used to her company and dependent on the services that she has provided for him. He goes on to tell her that he will miss her greatly if she were to go away. Eliza, on the other hand, becomes irate and accuses him of doing this experiment without thinking about the consequences. She tells him that it is Freddy that loves her and would make her happy.

Higgins protests that now they can settle down and live as three bachelors instead of two men and a silly girl but the play ends with Eliza and Mrs. Higgins leaving to attend Mr. Doolittle's wedding ceremony. Eliza's decision is never revealed. There are two major themes of the play. First and most importantly, it displays that with the right state of mind and the willingness to work hard, you can succeed in pretty much anything. The odds of a flower girl ending up being perceived as a royal duchess is not very probable, but with the determination of Professor Higgins and the willingness to learn of Eliza, it was accomplished. Phoneticians were very popular and well-respected people in the time this play was written.

This proves to be another important theme of the play. Shaw makes Higgins'c character a very popular and well-respected person throughout the play, there is not one time in which he is disrespected or put down in any way. At the royal embassy party, people all but lined up to talk to him.