Pygmalion

Pygmalion was originally written for the actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell. Later the play became the basis for two films and a musical. In his plays Shaw combined contemporary moral problems with ironic tone and paradoxes, "Shavian" wit, which have produced such phrases as… Pygmalion is a play by G. Bernard Shaw, written in 1912 and first staged in English in 1914. It is the story of Professor Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics, who wagers that he can turn a Cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, into the toast of London society merely by teaching her how to speak with an upper-class accent. In the process, he becomes fond of her and attempts to direct her future, but she rejects his domineering ways and marries a young aristocrat. At the end of the play, Eliza leaves Higgins to marry the aristocrat Freddy Eynsford-Hill. Shaw, annoyed by the tendency of audiences, actors, and even directors to seek 'romantic' re-interpretations of his ending, later wrote an essay for inclusion with subsequent editions in which he explained precisely why it was impossible for the story to end with Higgins and Eliza getting together.

About the play

The original stage play shocked audiences by Eliza's use of a swear word. Humor is drawn from her ability to speak well, but without an understanding of the conversation acceptable to polite society.

The staging

Shaw completed Pygmalion and later that same year it was translated into German. This is important because the very first performance was played by English actors in Vienna, Austria, with none other than Mrs. Patrick Campbell as Eliza Doolittle.

The language

For example, when asked whether she is walking home, Eliza replies, 'Not bloody likely!' The actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell, for whom Shaw wrote the role, was thought to risk her career by uttering the line.