"Pygmalion" is a well-known play that satirizes manners and class in
             Victorian England. The main characters, Professor Henry Higgins and flower
             girl Eliza Doolittle, are as different as night and day. Higgins is a
             successful linguist and member of the upper class, while Doolittle is a
             common girl who sells flowers on the streets of London. Higgins
             observes her and makes notes on her appalling accent, then invites her into
             his home to study her further. His friend, Pickering, is down to earth and
             interested in Eliza, and so he proposes a bet where Higgins takes Eliza
             into his home for six months and turns her into a "lady." Pickering and
             Eliza grow quite fond of each other, but in the end, Eliza learns enough to
             strike out on her own, and while she marries Freddy, she always retains her
             independence and her frank appraisal of others.
             Higgins is wealthy and eccentric. He is a member of the upper class,
             but he is absent-minded, childlike, and lacks many of the social graces
             that "gentlemen" are so proud of. He does have enough sociability to get
             along in society, but Shaw describes him as a "baby." He writes, "He is,
             in fact, but for his years and size, rather like a very impetuous baby
             'taking notice' eagerly and loudly, and requiring almost as much watching
             to keep him out of unintended mischief" (Shaw 128). Eliza, on the other
             hand, may speak like a "guttersnipe," and have the manners of the low
             class, but she is all woman and speaks her mind freely. At one point, in
             front of a group of society people, she states, "You see, it's like this.
             If a man has a bit of a conscience, it always takes him when he's sober;
             and then it makes him low-spirited. A drop of booze just takes that off
             and makes him happy: (Shaw 166). She can be taught manners and decorum,
             but she does not have to be taught how to tell the difference between a
             pompous professor and a good and decent hum...