Paper 2 HL – Sample 1.2 – Disgrace, Pygmalion
At first sight, Pygmalion, written and performed in London in 1914, and
Disgrace, written in South Africa in 1999, seem to come from such different
times and places that they could hardly have anything in common. On the
contrary, the conflicts between the characters in these works reflect similar
conflicts from the times and places in which they were written. Both works
explore such themes as male chauvinism and parental responsibilities, both of
which are issues of their respective time and place.
Both works question the position of women and men in their times. Both in
Disgrace and Pygmalion the protagonists, David Lurie and Henry Higgins, are
obvious male chauvinists. Henry Higgins asks his friend Colonel Pickering,
“Why can’t women be more like men?” He is a proud bachelor who fails to
understand women’s feelings. Liza Doolittle wins his bet for him, by proving
that she can learn to speak like a Duchess and fool others into believing that
she is not a common flower girl. Nevertheless, Higgins’ treatment of her is
disrespectful. Although he gives her chocolates, taxi rides and high tea with
the social elite, he fails to recognize her achievements and takes all of the
credit for her hard work. This play was first performed in a time when the
women’s suffrage movement was taking hold in England. The play stresses
the importance of women in society, as Liza becomes an emancipated and
powerful woman. At the same time, Shaw shows the limitations of women’s
status, as Liza’s marriage to Freddy is presented as her only way to maintain
her position among the social elite.
Disgrace explores the limitations of women in South Africa in a different way,
by focusing on sex. David Lurie abuses his position at the university when he
forces himself upon a student, Melanie. He says she has a duty to spread her
beauty among men. He justifies his promiscuity through constant reference to
Romanticism and Lord Byron’s affair with Teresa, the 14-year daughter of an
Italian duke. Once his own daughter, Lucy, is raped Lurie begins to think
differently about sex and power. In this violent and sudden turn of events, it
becomes obvious that the coloreds make claims on her land and farm by
“marking” her, as she describes it. Lurie is frustrated because he cannot do
anything about it. Lucy signs her land over to Petrus, the former servant, and
marries him, in order to protect herself from the colored community. The novel
was published at a time (1999) after apartheid, when white men came to
realize that they were no longer in power. Rape had become a means to
manipulate farmers off of their land. Lurie eventually apologizes for taking
advantage of Melanie, his colored student, as he realizes that he had behaved
as cruelly as the colored boys who raped his daughter.
Both Disgrace and Pygmalion explore how family relationships reflect the
© Brad Philpot, InThinking
www.englishalanglit-inthinking.co.uk
1 social problems of their times. In Pygmalion we see two distinctly different
relationships between parents and children. Liza and her father, Alex Doolittle,
have a relationship where the father is shamelessly dependent on his
daughter. He asks her for money to support his drinking habit, and he tries to
‘sell’ his daughter to Higgins for five pounds. Shaw shows how parents in the
working class depend on their children for care and support. In contrast to Liza
and Alex stands Henry Higgins’ pathetic dependence on his mother. Their
relationship shows how the elite are dependent on their parents for access to
social circles and wealth. Higgins always runs to his mother for help and
advice, even though he disagrees with her. Shaw shows us the elite’s
incompetency and dependence on old money in order to maintain power in
England and the stark differences between classes in 1914.
The family relationships in Disgrace also represent struggle of the times in
which the novel was written. David Lurie, his ex-wife and his daughter are
individualists. Lucy lives a completely different life than her father’s,
independent of his help with a different set of ideals and friends. She is a
lesbian on a rural farm, whereas David is an intellectual from the city. David
constantly tries to understand Lucy’s rape. He wants to console and protect
her, but she does not allow him. She will not allow him to press charges or
discuss the matter with her. Dissimilarly, Petrus’ family is extensive and tightly
knit. Petrus looks after Pollux, his nephew, and ensures that he is not
punished for raping Lucy. He throws a large party to celebrate that the land
has passed into his hands, inviting much family. He marries more than one
wife and has many children. In summary, the coloreds of South Africa are
depicted as powerful, because they are united by strong family ties. While the
whites are seen as weak and divided because of the individualistic ambitions
and private lives. This conflict in South Africa between whites and coloreds in
the late 1990s is depicted carefully through the families in this novel.
To conclude, these literary works, Pygmalion and Disgrace, are products of
their times. Pygmalion comments on the oppression of women and the
working class in London at the beginning of the 20th century. Disgrace
comments on the shift of power after apartheid in South. Both works explore
the social conflicts of their times by depicting characters that embody the
issues of oppression. Both Higgins and Lurie are white, chauvinist, intellectual
men who struggle to understand the rise of another class and race. Their
struggles reflect the context in which these works were written. © Brad Philpot, InThinking
www.englishalanglit-inthinking.co.uk
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