How Does Eliza Doolitle Change In Pygmalion

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How do you think a “poor flower girl’s” internal thoughts would be? Do you think they would change based on her appearance and her associates? Who is Eliza? Eliza Doolittle is a character in the play Pygmalion written by George Bernard Shaw , who played as a young adult was poor and didn’t keep up with herself. She was a flower girl who wasn’t well respected. Eliza changes throughout the book because in Act I, she was dingy and didn’t feel clean or look clean. Her speech was very bad. She got help from a man named Henry Higgins and his mother Mrs.Higgins. But now, in Act V, she is highly dresses catching others’ eyes when she’d walk in the room. She respects herself more than she did in the past. However, Eliza Doolittle’s thoughts has changed …show more content…

In Act I, Eliza talked down on herself by calling herself poor and things live that. In the text, it states, “He’s no gentleman, he ain’t, to interfere with a poor girl”. ( Page 20, Book ) This connects to my statement because this shows her referring to herself as a poor girl and she’s talking bad about herself. Another reason Eliza changed internally is because she does not see herself as a bum or poor anymore. She has saw that she needed to keep up with herself. She also wants to feel respected. According to page 119 of Pygmalion, it states, “Your calling me Miss Doolittle when I first came to Wimpole Street. That was the beginning of self-respect for me.” This shows that she is beginning to respect herself and think highly of herself. This proves that Eliza has changed …show more content…

At the beginning, people didn’t think highly of her but now, people do. When she came in Higgins’ laboratory, she came dressed differently and she looked good and looked like she kept up with herself. She is starting to have a different mindset of her appearance. For example, on page 74 of Pygmalion, it states, “ Eliza, who is exquisitely dressed, produces an impression of such remarkable distinction and beauty as she enters that they all rise, quite fluttered. Guided by Higgins’s signals, she comes to Mrs.Higgins with studied grace.” This proves that Eliza is changing her mindset, which occurs to affect her thoughts about herself, her speech, and her appearance. Eliza, first described as "not at all attractive," has become incredibly desirable thanks to some nice clothing, jewelry, and a few months of training. Also, Eliza has learned to that people who treat her with no respect cannot bring her down or allow her to go back to where she was in the beginning. Based on Act V in Pygmalion, Eliza has learned that nobody can bring her down. It states, “You know I can’t go back to the gutter, as you call it, and that I have no real friends in the world but you and the Colonel. You know well I couldn’t bear to live with a low common man after you two; and it’s wicked and cruel of you to insult me by pretending I could.” This means that no matter what anybody has to her, she will never go back down the path she was just on.

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