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Loading... Pygmalion (Enriched Classics Series) (edition 2005)by George Bernard Shaw
Work InformationPygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (Author)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I don‘t have much to say about this. A retelling of the myth, it‘s a very unusual premise for a play, but I‘m so glad it ends differently than the musical. The afterword by Shaw is helpful to read, but his analysis of the characters has a pop-psychology style which is bizarre. The only reason I‘m not panning this is because Eliza sticks up for herself at the end. I‘m rewatching the musical for a class so the comparison will be interesting. I bailed on this play after Act II because I found Henry Higgins to a patronizing chauvinist who thinks he knows best for everyone. He bullies Eliza Doolittle into becoming his protégée and goes far beyond his appropriate remit of giving elocution lessons by insisting she stay in his house and be given new clothes and taught to behave like a Lady. However, reading about the play after returning the book to the library tells me that Act III seems to be where the play really gets going, and that Higgins gets his comeuppance. But I had too many books on the shelves to read and had already dragged my feet about reading this play to begin with, renewing the book three times before even touching it, so although I don’t plan to come back to the play, I feel it would be unfair to rate it. The edition of the play I read came in an omnibus with four other Shaw plays and had a preface as well as extra scenes added from the motion picture version and photos from early stage productions. Also, I’d forgotten that one of Shaw’s hobbyhorses was reforming the English language, and that comes across in the missing apostrophes in contractions (cant rather than can’t, wont rather than won’t). So those parts of the reading experience were interesting. This is the original play version much better known as the musical My Fair Lady. As such, this lacks the variety of scenes of the latter, with the Ambassador's ball taking place off-stage and no Ascot race day. The hilarious scenes of Eliza's elocution lessons ("the rain in Spain is mainly in the plain" etc. are missing here). Aside from that, the dialogue is nearly identical and sparkles and flows like quicksilver though, as when I saw the musical a few days ago, I was irritated by the way Eliza is treated not only by Higgins, but perhaps even more so by the housekeeper Mrs Pearce, as though she is little more than an object with no feelings. In any case, the play/musical are both well worth reading/watching. no reviews | add a review
Belongs to Publisher SeriesCentopaginemillelire (238) Nobelpreisträger Coron-Verlag (weiß) (1925 (Irland)) — 9 more Penguin Plays (PL3) Reader's Enrichment Series (RE 128) Reclams Universal-Bibliothek (8204) suhrkamp taschenbuch (1859) Warbler Classics (man and superman shaw) Zwarte Beertjes (776) Is contained inHas the (non-series) sequelHas the adaptationInspiredHas as a commentary on the textHas as a student's study guideAwardsNotable Lists
Classic Literature.
Drama.
Fiction.
HTML: In George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion a phonetician believes the power of speech is such that he can introduce a Cockney flower girl to polite society after careful language and etiquette training, and no one will discern her true roots. The professor and the flower girl grown close, but after her successful debut she rejects the professor and his overbearing ways for a poor gentleman. The most famous adaptation of the play is the 1964 film My Fair Lady, starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison. .No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)822.912Literature English & Old English literatures English drama 1900- 1900-1999 20th Century 1900-1945LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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Although I've never seen My Fair Lady (a travesty, I know), I've heard of it quite a bit - so reading the source play made a lot of sense when I picked this up.
The story is simple enough - two bachelors making a bet to themselves that they could pass off a flower girl as a princess in six months - and the younger of the two falling in love (or not, it's never made clear) with the flower girl in the process.
I'll not spoil it for others who've never read it, but the ending was a welcome surprise. There are two endings in the version I read, along with a sequel of sorts - in which Shaw elaborates why he chose the ending he did (which is rife with casual sexism), but if you can get past that - I suppose it does make sense.
Pygmalion was a pleasant and short read, with some laugh-out-loud moments - I couldn't have asked for anything more. ( )