George Bernard Shaw a penn State Electronic Classics Series Publication

ing over it to her] For the fun of it. That’s why I took you on.
LIZA 
[with averted face] And you may throw me out tomor-
row if I don’t do everything you want me to?
HIGGINS
. Yes; and you may walk out tomorrow if I don’t
do everything YOU want me to.
LIZA
. And live with my stepmother?
HIGGINS
. Yes, or sell flowers.
LIZA
. Oh! if I only COULD go back to my flower basket! I
should be independent of both you and father and all the
world! Why did you take my independence from me? Why
did I give it up? I’m a slave now, for all my fine clothes.
HIGGINS
. Not a bit. I’ll adopt you as my daughter and
settle money on you if you like. Or would you rather marry
Pickering?
LIZA 
[looking fiercely round at him] I wouldn’t marry YOU
if you asked me; and you’re nearer my age than what he is.

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80
Pygmalion
HIGGINS 
[gently] Than he is: not “than what he is.”
LIZA 
[losing her temper and rising] I’ll talk as I like. You’re
not my teacher now.
HIGGINS 
[reflectively] I don’t suppose Pickering would,
though. He’s as confirmed an old bachelor as I am.
LIZA
. That’s not what I want; and don’t you think it. I’ve
always had chaps enough wanting me that way. Freddy Hill
writes to me twice and three times a day, sheets and sheets.
HIGGINS 
[disagreeably surprised] Damn his impudence! [He
recoils and finds himself sitting on his heels].
LIZA
. He has a right to if he likes, poor lad. And he does
love me.
HIGGINS 
[getting of the ottoman] You have no right to en-
courage him.
LIZA
. Every girl has a right to be loved.
HIGGINS
. What! By fools like that?
LIZA
. Freddy’s not a fool. And if he’s weak and poor and
wants me, may be he’d make me happier than my betters
that bully me and don’t want me.
HIGGINS
. Can he MAKE anything of you? That’s the point.
LIZA
. Perhaps I could make something of him. But I never
thought of us making anything of one another; and you never
think of anything else. I only want to be natural.
HIGGINS
. In short, you want me to be as infatuated about
you as Freddy? Is that it?
LIZA
. No I don’t. That’s not the sort of feeling I want from
you. And don’t you be too sure of yourself or of me. I could
have been a bad girl if I’d liked. I’ve seen more of some things
than you, for all your learning. Girls like me can drag gentle-
men down to make love to them easy enough. And they
wish each other dead the next minute.
HIGGINS
. Of course they do. Then what in thunder are
we quarrelling about?
LIZA 
[much troubled] I want a little kindness. I know I’m a
common ignorant girl, and you a book-learned gentleman;
but I’m not dirt under your feet. What I done [correcting
herself] what I did was not for the dresses and the taxis: I did
it because we were pleasant together and I come—came—to
care for you; not to want you to make love to me, and not

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81
Shaw
forgetting the difference between us, but more friendly like.
HIGGINS
. Well, of course. That’s just how I feel. And how
Pickering feels. Eliza: you’re a fool.
LIZA
. That’s not a proper answer to give me [she sinks on the
chair at the writing-table in tears].
HIGGINS
. It’s all you’ll get until you stop being a common
idiot. If you’re going to be a lady, you’ll have to give up feel-
ing neglected if the men you know don’t spend half their
time snivelling over you and the other half giving you black
eyes. If you can’t stand the coldness of my sort of life, and
the strain of it, go back to the gutter. Work til you are more
a brute than a human being; and then cuddle and squabble
and drink til you fall asleep. Oh, it’s a fine life, the life of the
gutter. It’s real: it’s warm: it’s violent: you can feel it through
the thickest skin: you can taste it and smell it without any
training or any work. Not like Science and Literature and
Classical Music and Philosophy and Art. You find me cold,
unfeeling, selfish, don’t you? Very well: be off with you to
the sort of people you like. Marry some sentimental hog or
other with lots of money, and a thick pair of lips to kiss you
with and a thick pair of boots to kick you with. If you can’t
appreciate what you’ve got, you’d better get what you can
appreciate.
LIZA 
[desperate] Oh, you are a cruel tyrant. I can’t talk to
you: you turn everything against me: I’m always in the wrong.
But you know very well all the time that you’re nothing but
a bully. 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. You think I must go
back to Wimpole Street because I have nowhere else to go
but father’s. But don’t you be too sure that you have me un-
der your feet to be trampled on and talked down. I’ll marry
Freddy, I will, as soon as he’s able to support me.
HIGGINS 
[sitting down beside her] Rubbish! you shall marry
an ambassador. You shall marry the Governor-General of
India or the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or somebody who
wants a deputy-queen. I’m not going to have my master-
piece thrown away on Freddy.
LIZA
. You think I like you to say that. But I haven’t forgot
what you said a minute ago; and I won’t be coaxed round as
if I was a baby or a puppy. If I can’t have kindness, I’ll have
independence.
HIGGINS
. Independence? That’s middle class blasphemy.
We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on
earth.

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82
Pygmalion
LIZA 
[rising determinedly] I’ll let you see whether I’m de-
pendent on you. If you can preach, I can teach. I’ll go and be
a teacher.
HIGGINS
. What’ll you teach, in heaven’s name?
LIZA
. What you taught me. I’ll teach phonetics.
HIGGINS
. Ha! Ha! Ha!
LIZA
. I’ll offer myself as an assistant to Professor Nepean.
HIGGINS 
[rising in a fury] What! That impostor! that hum-
bug! that toadying ignoramus! Teach him my methods! my
discoveries! You take one step in his direction and I’ll wring
your neck. [He lays hands on her]. Do you hear?
LIZA 
[defiantly non-resistant] Wring away. What do I care? I
knew you’d strike me some day. [He lets her go, stamping with