Point of View, Tone, and Theme
The play is presented from a third person point of view. It is evident that Pygmalion is a representation of Shaw's own thoughts on the concept of love. Love was an entity that did not prevail in his own life, and the author thus approaches it with a cynical tone in the play. Shaw examines the motives of each of his characters and treats them with scorn, finding every character in his play (and in the world itself) guilty of a degradation of society. In the play, the characters associate love with physical appearances as opposed to a sincere, passionate, fondness of a character's self. Taking a step back, however, Pygmalion does have a comical tone and witty characters. A theme present in the play is that of social roles. Shaw criticizes these class distinctions and unequal opportunities. These social barriers become evident in Act I, where people of different backgrounds and classes interact with each other in the midst of inclement weather. A theme that coincides with that of specified places in society is that of appearance versus reality. Eliza is able to fool society about her true identity based on her apperance as transformed by Henry Higgins. With Eliza's comment to Pickering in Act V, "You see, really and truly, apart from the things anyone can pick up (the dressing and the proper way of speaking, and so on), the difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how shes treated" (97), this theme is enforced. Also clearly present in the play is a theme of Shaw's idea of romanticism. True, pure love did not exist in Shaw's life, and true, pure love does not exist in Shaw's play.