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Pygmalion | Act III, Act III - Page 5

HIGGINS:
[assailing her at the other ear] Yes, by George: it's the most absorbing experiment I ever tackled. She regularly fills our lives up; doesn't she, Pick?
PICKERING:
We're always talking Eliza.
HIGGINS:
Teaching Eliza.
PICKERING:
Dressing Eliza.
MRS. HIGGINS:
What!
HIGGINS:
Inventing new Elizas.
HIGGINS:
You know, she has the most extraordinary quickness of ear:
PICKERING:
I assure you, my dear Mrs. Higgins, that girl

[speaking together]

HIGGINS:
just like a parrot. I've tried her with every
PICKERING:
is a genius. She can play the piano quite beautifully
HIGGINS:
possible sort of sound that a human being can make—
PICKERING:
We have taken her to classical concerts and to music
HIGGINS:
Continental dialects, African dialects, Hottentot
PICKERING:
halls; and it's all the same to her: she plays everything
HIGGINS:
clicks, things it took me years to get hold of; and
PICKERING:
she hears right off when she comes home, whether it's
HIGGINS:
she picks them up like a shot, right away, as if she had
PICKERING:
Beethoven and Brahms or Lehar and Lionel Morickton;

[speaking together]

HIGGINS:
been at it all her life. though six months ago, she'd never as
PICKERING:
much as touched a piano—
MRS. HIGGINS:
[putting her fingers in her ears, as they are by this time shouting one another down with an intolerable noise] Sh—sh—sh—sh! [They stop].
PICKERING:
I beg your pardon. [He draws his chair back apologetically].
HIGGINS:
Sorry. When Pickering starts shouting nobody can get a word in edgeways.
MRS. HIGGINS:
Be quiet, Henry. Colonel Pickering: don't you realize that when Eliza walked into Wimpole Street, something walked in with her?
PICKERING:
Her father did. But Henry soon got rid of him.
MRS. HIGGINS:
It would have been more to the point if her mother had. But as her mother didn't something else did.
PICKERING:
But what?
MRS. HIGGINS:
[unconsciously dating herself by the word] A problem.
PICKERING:
Oh, I see. The problem of how to pass her off as a lady.
HIGGINS:
I'll solve that problem. I've half solved it already.
MRS. HIGGINS:
No, you two infinitely stupid male creatures: the problem of what is to be done with her afterwards.
HIGGINS:
I don't see anything in that. She can go her own way, with all the advantages I have given her.
MRS. HIGGINS:
The advantages of that poor woman who was here just now! The manners and habits that disqualify a fine lady from earning her own living without giving her a fine lady's income! Is that what you mean?
PICKERING:
[indulgently, being rather bored] Oh, that will be all right, Mrs. Higgins. [He rises to go].
HIGGINS:
[rising also] We'll find her some light employment.
PICKERING:
She's happy enough. Don't you worry about her. Good-bye. [He shakes hands as if he were consoling a frightened child, and makes for the door].
HIGGINS:
Anyhow, there's no good bothering now. The thing's done. Goodbye, mother. [He kisses her, and follows Pickering].
PICKERING:
[turning for a final consolation] There are plenty of openings. We'll do what's right. Good-bye.
HIGGINS:
[to Pickering as they go out together] Let's take her to the Shakespear exhibition at Earls Court.
PICKERING:
Yes: let's. Her remarks will be delicious.
HIGGINS:
She'll mimic all the people for us when we get home.
PICKERING:
Ripping. [Both are heard laughing as they go downstairs].
MRS. HIGGINS:
[rises with an impatient bounce, and returns to her work at the writing-table. She sweeps a litter of disarranged papers out of her way; snatches a sheet of paper from her stationery case; and tries resolutely to write. At the third line she gives it up; flings down her pen; grips the table angrily and exclaims] Oh, men! men!! men!!!
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