Pygmalion (Penguin Classics)
A play that examines personal transformation and social prejudice through language, class, and education. Using Eliza Doolittle’s ascent, it portrays the relationship between identity and speech with humor and sharp satire.
Work Information
To change speech is also to change a person’s shape.
Through Eliza Doolittle’s lessons with Higgins, the play asks how class society sets its rules and how an individual claims independence. Beneath the witty dialogue, it sharply shows how language rearranges human relationships.
Book Information
- Publisher
- Penguin Classics
- Published
- 2003-02-04
- Pages
- 176 pages
- Language
- 英語
- Size
- 12.9 x 1 x 19.9 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9780141439501
- ISBN-10
- 0141439505
- Price
- 2395 JPY
- Category
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/History & Criticism/Movements & Periods/Gothic & Romantic
Exclusive to Penguin Classics: the definitive text of Shaw’s brilliantly witty exposure of the British class system—part of the official Bernard Shaw Library A Penguin Classic Shaw wrote the part of Eliza Doolittle—“an east-end dona with an apron and three orange and red ostrich feathers”—for Mrs. Patrick Campbell, with whom he had a passionate but unconsummated affair. From the outset the play was a sensational success, although Shaw, irritated by its popularity at the expense of his artistic intentions, dismissed it as a potboiler. The Pygmalion of legend falls in love with his perfect female statue and persuades Venus to bring her to life so that he can marry her. But Shaw radically reworks Ovid’s tale to give it a feminist slant: while Higgins teaches Eliza to speak and act like a duchess, she also asserts her independence, adamantly refusing to be his creation. This Penguin Classics edition is the definitive text produced under the editorial supervision of Dan H. Laurence, with an illuminating introduction by Nicholas Grene, discussing the language and politics of the play. Included in this volume is Shaw’s preface, as well as his “sequel” written for the first publication in 1916, to rebut public demand for a more conventionally romantic ending. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) is one of the world’s greatest literary figures. Born in Dublin, Ireland, he left school at fourteen and in 1876 went to London, where he began his literary career with a series of unsuccessful novels. In 1884 he became a founder of the Fabian Society, the famous British socialist organization. After becoming a reviewer and drama critic, he published a study of the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen in 1891 and became determined to create plays as he felt Ibsen did: to shake audiences out of their moral complacency and to attack social problems. However, Shaw was an irrepressible wit, and his plays are as entertaining as they are socially provocative. Basically shy, Shaw created a public persona for himself: G.B.S., a bearded eccentric, crusading social critic, antivivisectionist, language reformer, strict vegetarian, and renowned public speaker. The author of fifty-three plays, hundreds of essays, reviews, and letters, and several books, Shaw is best known for Widowers’ Houses, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, Arms and the Man, Caesar and Cleopatra, Man and Superman, Major Barbara, Pygmalion, Heartbreak House, and Saint Joan . He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925. Nicholas Grene (introducer) was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, and the University of Cambridge. He is now a professor of English literature at Trinity College, as well as a senior fellow. His books include Synge: A Critical Study of the Plays , Bernard Shaw: A Critical View , and The Politics of Irish Drama . Dan H. Laurence (series editor; 1920–2008) was series editor for the works of George Bernard Shaw in Penguin. Formerly a New York University faculty member, Mr. Laurence left his tenured position in 1970 to dedicated his life to the collection and curation of Shaw's life, work, and letters. He served as the official literary advisor to Shaw's estate and published four volumes of his correspondence.
Reviews
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迅速
迅速で綺麗な梱包、内容も問題ありませんでした。とても満足です。 ありがとう。
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ElizaとHigginsの男女の微妙な心理がこめられた会話が秀逸です
映画“My Fair Lady”の原作で，ロンドンなまり（cockney）のひどい花売り娘ElizaをHiggins教授とPickering大佐が教育して，公爵夫人として通用する女性に仕立てあげていくという物語です（結末は映画とは違います）． cockneyをアルファベットで音写した部分はさすがにわかりにくいですが，それではロンドンっ子以外のイギリス人にもわからないだろうとShawが考えたためか，そのような部分は10行もなく，ほとんどはハリウッド映画で田舎の人の話す英語（ain’t，them slippersなど）程度に抑えられていますので，英語としてはそんなに難しくありません．100年前の作品ですが，現代日本人が旧仮名遣いの夏目漱石の作品を読むよりは，現代イギリス人が本作品を読む方がやさしいのではないかと思います．もっとも，現代の作品であろうと，100年前の作品であろうと，辞書なしには十分に理解できない私の英語力のために，そう思っているだけかもしれません． 本作品を階級差のほとんどない現代日本語に訳すのはかなり難しいのではなかろうかと最初は思っていたのですが，読み進むうちにそれはたいした問題ではないように思えてきました．むしろ，ストーリーの山場をなす，Elizaが公爵夫人を演じ切った大使館でのパーティーからHigginsの研究室に戻ってきたときの，ElizaとHigginsの男女の微妙な心理がこめられた会話をどう日本語で表現するかということの方が難しいように感じました． 本作品の日本語訳は，Amazonで検索すると1993年発行の白水社版（古本のみで4,600円〜）と2012年発行の同じく白水社の新装復刻版（新本で6,930円）がありますが，ともに高いのでまだ読んでいません．本年11月8日に発行予定の小田島恒志さん訳の光文社文庫版が待ち遠しいです．付け加えれば，11月13日より新国立劇場で上演される同訳，宮田慶子さん演出の“ピグマリオン”にも期待したいです．
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Pygmalion
過去にカセットで入手可能であった作品。ミュージカル「マイ・フェア・レディ」の原作であるカセット版 Pygmalion は、聞き苦しい音飛び、A面からB面への音の途切れ、さらにはノイズといった問題はあるものの Shaw の戯曲を生き生きと伝えてくれる貴重な録音でした。このたびCD化され全てが改善。すばらしい音質でヒギンズ教授の British English、花売り娘イライザの Cockney 訛りを楽しむことができます。ハリウッド版がお好きな方、また英語音声学に関心のある方には、是非とも、このオリジナル版に耳を傾けて頂きたい。必ずしや最適の教材となることと思います。
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有名なマイ・フェア・レディの原作：英語で名作を読む手始めにお薦め
あまりにも有名なミュージカル・映画マイ・フェア・レディの原作・戯曲です。私は大学１年の教養課程で英語の授業で読んだのですが、それまでに映画マイ・フェア・レディを数回観たことがあったので、とても楽しく読めました。筋はほぼ同じで、下町言葉しか話せないロンドンの花売り娘イライザが音声学の権威ヒギンズ教授によって英語をたたきなおされ、貴婦人に変身していき、その過程で彼女にもレディの自覚・誇りがめばえ、教授や周囲の脇役との関係に変化が生じていきます。映画は原作をどのように脚色したのか、自分で確かめてみて下さい。結末は映画と違って辛口ですが、私はいかにもバーナード・ショー的な終わり方も好きです。高卒程度の英語で十分読みこなせ、映画の筋を知っていればそれがナヴィゲーターになってくれるし、その映画と対比する面白さに満ちた良書。英語で本を１冊読み通すには実に適した作品だと考えます。特にマイ・フェア・レディのファンには是非チェレンジすることを薦めます。この戯曲は様々な会社が出版しているようですが、本書が一番手頃だと思います。最後に、私は今でも大学の教養課程でこの戯曲を教材に選んでくれた教授に感謝しています。
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洋書
本の手ざわりもよく、活字もはっきりとして、読みやすい
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Why did he discard the idea?
It is not rare that a movie is made on the basis of a novel. It is also not rare that the movie made in such a way is a little different from the original novel. As far as I know, there is no movie in which the dichotomy between the novel and the movie based on it is greater than Bernard Shaw’s ‘Pygmalion’ and the American movie ‘My Fair Lady’ based on it. The play ends making the relation between Higgins and Eliza rather ambiguous, but Shaw adds what is called an epilogue, and tells the reader what happened afterwards. He writes, “This being the state of human affairs, what is Eliza fairly sure to do when she is placed between Freddy and Higgins? Will she look forward to a lifetime of fetching Higgins's slippers or to a lifetime of Freddy fetching hers? There can be no doubt about the answer. Unless Freddy is biologically repulsive to her, and Higgins biologically attractive to a degree that overwhelms all her other instincts, she will, if she marries either of them, marry Freddy. And that is just what Eliza did.” As everyone who has seen ‘My Fair Lady’ knows, Eliza doesn’t marry Freddy, but presumably marries Higgins. What accounts for this very different ending than each other? First of all, why did he add the epilogue? Basically plays are written to be acted, not to be read. Thinking that the writing epilogue is not supposed to offer to the audience in the theater, the story should be concluded only in the acts. It is difficult to see why Shaw should have bothered to add the epilogue in the writing style contrary to the rule of plays, but what is more difficult to see is that when ‘Pygmalion’ was made into a movie in 1938, Shaw himself took part in the making of the script and changed the content of the epilogue in the way Eliza marries Higgins, which became the precedent of ‘My Fair Lady’. Why did he discard the idea that Eliza marries Freddy in spite of his undue efforts to impress the reader the idea by bothering to add the epilogue? I don’t know why unless he was caught in the middle between his antipathy towards rich people as a socialist and his consciousness of having finally become a member of the celebrity.
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Not the original text and full of mistakes
I am a native English speaker. This edition is full of mistakes and is not an accurate representation of Shaw's original text. イギリス人です。この本の書き写しが間違いだらけです。注意してください。
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Die Lieferung war pünktlich und auch alles war in Ordnung. Das Buch ist auch sehr gut. Die vielfältigen Themen des Geschichtes sind einfach toll.
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Not quite sure what the other reviewers were reading, the only thing I can think of is elizas initial dialogue has been interpreted as a bad translation. Just made me smile. Perfect for English literature A level. Thank you very much.
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Su lectura suscita conexiones con muchas realidades actuales. Y sugiere interesantes reflexiones. Lo leí hace mucho tiempo pero ahora tengo puntos de vista que entonces me faltaban
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Read this book and find out. Now I know what happens to Elizabeth Doolittle. If you read this book you will too.
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Comprato quando andavo al liceo, arrivato in condizioni ottime. Consigliato per chi studia lingue e letteratura. Approvato e consigliato!