etching his slippers.Pygmalion looks at the superficiality of upper class society, a society in which social status is determined by the language that one speaks, one's manners, and the clothes one wears. It is astounding that Higgins is able to pass Eliza off as an elite, and Hungarian royalty at that, merely by altering her appearance and speech. The wealthy are so superficial they can not see past Eliza's appearance. On a deeper level, Pygmalion addresses the social ills in England at the turn of the century. Victorian England was characterized by extreme class division and limited, to no, social mobility. Language separated the elite from the lower class. In Pygmalion, Eliza's dialect inhibits her from procuring a job in a flower shop; Pygmalion is about the universal truth that all people are worthy of respect and dignity, from the wealthy nobleman to the beggar on the street corner. The difference between a common flower girl and a duchess, apart from appearance and demeanor, is the way she is treated. Treat the flower girl as if she were a duchess, worthy of respect and decency, and she will become a better person as a result....
