How Is Eliza Doolittle Presented In Acts 1 and 2?
Eliza Doolittle is presented at the start of the play as a nobody-a poor flower girl, earning a small amount of money on the streets. She is portrayed as being very dirty, with her hair in need of a wash and being dressed in old, dirty clothes. Her boots need repairing and she needs the services of a dentist. At the start of the play, Freddy Hill knocks her flowers on the floor and she asks Mrs. Hill to pay for them. However, even though the mother is prepared to pay, Clara, the daughter does not want to because she sees the flower girl as being dirty and below herself. The stage directions explain 'she is not a romantic figure. She is perhaps eighteen, perhaps twenty, slightly older'. It is here, when they are waiting for the rain to stop, that the flower girl talks to Colonel Pickering and meets Henry Higgins who is writing down the words that she is saying. Little did she know, the man was taking it down to study her accent, but the flower girl thought he was a police officer. The flower girl kept mumbling to herself 'I'm a good girl I am' because she believed that she was talking to a police officer.It is here that Henry Higgins and Colonel Pickering meet and Eliza keeps getting upset and eventually she drives off in a taxi,
goes home, and then, not bothering to get undressed gets into bed and falls asleep. Eliza thinks of herself as a respectable young lady and tries to keep her dignity throughout Acts 1 and 2. she makes it very clear that she is not a prostitute or anything along those lines, when, in the first act, she keeps repeating 'I'm a good girl I am' emphasizing that she does not have any loose habits such as drink either. In addition, when again in Act1, she realizes Higgins is behind her taking down what she says, she thinks he is a 'coppers nark' and is trying to get her arrested. She does not realize that he is just trying to make notes about her accent, from Lisson Grove. When this is happening and she believes him to be a police officer, she forgets her dignity and breaks down weeping and protesting her innocence. However, when she realises that he is not a police officer she attempts to regain her dignity, unsuccessfully. The audience see Eliza as a vulnerable girl who is defenceless on the streets reduced to selling flowers. When she breaks down crying, it makes the audience feel pity for her and then when she goes to Henry Higgins and Colonel Pickering in Wimpole Street to pay for speaking l
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Approximate Word count = 811
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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