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A* Pygmalion x Atonement english literature coursework
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Coursework from the academic year 2020/2021. Comparing Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw with Atonement by Ian McEwan - received an A*.
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Candidate name: Isabella Mae Ram Candidate number: 5280 Centre number: 52211Compare the ways Shaw and McEwan craft their work using language,
form and structure within their respective genres to investigate the way
characters’ sense of their identity are influenced by their social class in
Atonement and Pygmalion.
In Atonement and Pygmalion, authors McEwan and Shaw craft their
texts to highlight the social discrimination of their time and influence their
readers or audiences from the messages they portray, which usually
vouch for greater quality across society. The writers use their literary
freedom to their advantage. By using varying viewpoints and perspectives
they successfully allow the readers to watch and learn from the characters
questioning their identity. In Pygmalion, Eliza’s transformation leads her to
feeling angry at her new level of education as she discovers what she has
truly learnt; that she cannot return to her old life and job and at the same
time she also cannot fit in with her new social class. Comparatively in
Atonement, the two narratives of the fountain scene highlights how
Briony’s skewed perspective affects her identity, personality and her
treatment of Robbie. Part two of the book focuses on Robbie’s
experiences as a soldier, however it is important to remember McEwan
uses the mouthpiece of older Briony to create this non-fiction, following
the pattern of immaturity and naivety in his writing. The characters are
constructed to always question their identity when they experience the
emotion of empathy crossing social boundaries, which can lead to the
characters changing for the better or worse. In Atonement, the revelation
at the end of the novel where McEwan reveals most of Briony’s story is
made up, is a crucial moment for the readers to gain a full opinion of the
character Briony, however her lack of empathy in her last words, and
disregard for Cecilia and Robbie as real people, shows the reader the life-
long effect on the couple. Education is seen as a tool to improve one’s life
but as these two writers have shown, it is not always a success and can
leave some people feeling excluded from society. The aim of both writers
is to tell a story about their character and to also create a moral message
for the audience and readers alike.
The character’s identity is questioned when they challenged their
social class in both texts through the different perspectives and
viewpoints expressed by the author. The long complex novel of
atonement is written from 4 characters perspectives portraying a variety
of emotions and scenes that would have been otherwise have remained
hidden. The main narrator, Briony, is completely unreliable. We read two
narrations of the fountain scene, Cecilia’s, who is an active character in
the conversation, and Briony’s who watches through a window. During
Cecilia’s point of view, it is important to question the accuracy of the
events being described which is the first time the reader starts to distrust
Briony as a narrator. The events that follows further consolidate that
younger Briony was a selfish, immature girl who make up childish
storylines- a product of the sheltered, upper class life she has lived where
, Candidate name: Isabella Mae Ram Candidate number: 5280 Centre number: 52211
her individual identity is limited. Her simple opinion of Robbie’s education,
“her father had subsidised Robbie’s education all his life?” highlights her
immaturity and lack of understanding of the situation. Robbie’s
experience of war in France is crafted by mature Briony, who can at times
be unreliable as a narrator; as how could an upper-class girl with limited
experiences of the turmoil of war correctly present the troubles being
faced by other characters. But as this character grows older her
conscience and morals resulting in her identity being revealed as she
attempts to atone. At the end of the novel, it is revealed to the reader that
Briony is suffering with dementia and versions of this book have been
written through multiple drafts over the years which is ironic, as the truth
finally is revealed as the characters memory fades. Critic Whipple points
out: "England is on the brink of war; Briony, a budding writer, is on the
edge of adolescence", this is correct and highlights how a beginner writer
with a personal agenda should not have attempted to portray an accurate
account of the most devastating event in British history. Her adolescence
was holding her back but as she grew older it allowed her to question her
identity and now shapes how we read the novel.
The contrast between the time differences in the play is significant in
understanding how their identity has changed. The political comedy play
Pygmalion has a time frame of six months and there is no narrative voice
which shows all the opinions and thoughts of the characters all their own.
The aim is for Eliza to pass as a Duchess, which she does in six months as
she moves from a lower-class girl selling flowers outside theatres to an
upper-class lady. She is moulded by Higgins, Pickering, Mrs Pearce and
Mrs Higgins however she remains the strong minded and morally aware
girl she was before. It is her exterior appearance which changes, her
education has shaped her identity however she argues “The difference
between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she’s
treated.”, which shows that she is aware of the change in herself, but it is
the treatment from other people which truly shape a person. Most of the
audience will be upper class and this will force them to consider their
value within this class and if they are utilising the benefits of the freedoms
of the upper society. Critic Nietzsche states ‘When you go to women, take
your whip with you.’ This is completely incorrect of the novel. The
education she received was never intended to control or objectify her,
only to offer an opportunity to change her life. However, it is plausible
other readers could view the gentlemen’s actions this way when Mrs
Higgins remarks ‘you certainly are a pretty pair of babies, playing with
your live doll.’ The connotations that come with the metaphoric
descriptions of the word ‘doll’ suggest that Higgins and were just
moulding her and using her to win their bet. Mrs Higgins pointing this out
shows the reader the trauma this is having on Eliza, who is being treated
as no more than an inanimate object. Both the novel and the play are
dictated strongly by social class constraints, and how the characters are
bound to their limits. Robbie struggles to break away from stigma of being
born from a working-class mother, and Eliza’s father allows his daughter
to be sold into an Upper-Class family, but this does not mean she is
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