Character guide

Henry Higgins

major

Also known as Professor Higgins, Higgins, Higgins Hastily, Higgins Arrogant, Higgins Tempted, Higgins Really, Higgins Oh Lord, Higgins Lord, Higgins Damnation, Higgins Liar, Higgins Rising, Pygmalion Higgins

Higgins commands drawing rooms and lecture halls with equal rudeness, cataloguing strangers' vowels as casually as he insults his own mother's guests. His genuine genius is inseparable from his childishness: he bullies, wheedles, and loses his temper like a spoiled boy, convinced that feeling is a subject he never bothered to study. His experiment on Eliza becomes the story's engine precisely because he cannot see her as a person, only as proof of his method.

Eliza Doolittle

major

Also known as Liza, Eliza, Elizabeth, Betsy, Liza Coyly, Liza Darkly, Liza Angrily, Liza Weeping, Liza Rising, Liza No, Liza Continuing, The Flower Girl, Girl, The Flower Girl Garn, The Flower Girl Appalled, Miss Doolittle

Eliza arrives at Wimpole Street with three ostrich feathers, a shoddy coat, and the nerve to demand lessons like any paying customer, refusing to be called a baggage. Her quick temper and quicker instincts make her far more than clay in Higgins's hands, and her affectionate nature bristles against his casual cruelty. Her transformation drives the play's central question: whether changing a woman's speech can change what she is allowed to be.

Colonel Pickering

supporting

Also known as Pickering, Pickering Cheerfully, Pickering Right, Pickering Oh, Pickering Shaking, Pickering Rising, Pickering Astonished, Pickering Gently, Pickering Laughing, Pickering Quietly, Pickering By Jove, Pickering Doolittle, Pickering Beethoven, Pickering Dressing Eliza, the Colonel, Colonel

Pickering arrives in London steeped in Indian dialects and gentlemanly manners, the perfect foil to Higgins's domestic savagery. He funds the experiment and shares its risks, yet his instinct is always to ask the girl what she wants rather than to command her. His quiet decency becomes the play's measuring stick: Eliza later credits him, not Higgins, with teaching her to be a lady.

Mrs. Pearce

supporting

Also known as Mrs. Pearce Nonsense, Mrs. Pearce Severely, Mrs. Pearce Stop, Mrs. Pearce Mr. Higgins, Mrs. Pearce Patiently

Mrs. Pearce runs the household of a man who cannot find his own appointments, and she is the first to notice that a common girl in his study raises awkward questions. She warns Higgins about his language and his behavior, only half resigned to being overruled. Her practical concern for Eliza's welfare gives the audience its first hint that the experiment has a human cost.

Mrs. Higgins

supporting

Also known as Mrs. Higgins Oh Henry, Mrs. Higgins Henry, Mrs. Higgins Shaking, Mrs. Higgins Rising, Act V Mrs. Higgins

Mrs. Higgins receives her son's phonetics experiments, stray dustmen, and startled guests with the same dry composure, correcting Henry's manners with a single raised eyebrow. She understands him better than he understands himself, diagnosing his inveterate bachelordom and warning him that Eliza has rights. Her drawing room is where the play's social comedy sharpens into judgment, and where Eliza's transformation is first seen by the world.

Alfred Doolittle

supporting

Also known as Mr. Doolittle, Doolittle, Doolittle Sadly, Doolittle Landlady, Doolittle Rising, Doolittle Morning, Doolittle Protesting, Doolittle Sweetly, Doolittle Bridegroom

Doolittle appears at Wimpole Street looking for his daughter and instead blames Higgins for ruining him: a joke in a letter has made him a gentleman, tied neck and heels to respectability. He was happy, free, and able to touch everyone for money; now everyone touches him. His comic outrage carries the play's sharpest satire on class, exposing how much of so-called morality is simply a matter of income.

Freddy Eynsford Hill

supporting

Also known as Freddy, Freddy Sorry, Freddy Bowing . Ahdedo, Ahdedo, Freddy Hill, Freddy Killing, young Mr. Frederick Eynsford Hill, Frederick Eynsford Hill, Mr. F. Hill

Freddy belongs to the genteel-poor Eynsford Hills, forever trailing after his mother and sister and apologizing for his own inadequacy. His comic helplessness — sent out for a cab, he returns soaked and empty-handed while his sister calls him a selfish pig — marks him as a foil to Higgins's domineering competence. When he later encounters Eliza, his instant infatuation gives her a suitor from the very class she is being trained to enter, quietly complicating the play's questions about where she truly belongs.

Clara Eynsford Hill

minor

Also known as Clara, Clara Rising, Poor Clara, Miss Eynsford Hill, Miss Eynsford Hill Gaily

Freddy's sister, a social-climbing young woman impressed by Eliza's new speech.

The Parlormaid

minor

Also known as The Parlormaid Colonel Pickering, The Parlormaid Mr. Henry

Higgins's household maid who announces visitors.

Mr. H. G. Wells

minor

Also known as Wells, Mr. Wells

A contemporary author mentioned in passing.

Mrs. Eynsford Hill

minor

Also known as Mrs. Eynsford Hill Introducing, Mrs. Eynsford Hill Rising, Mrs. Eynsford Hill Half rising

Freddy and Clara's mother, a genteel but impoverished widow.

Henry Sweet

minor

Also known as Sweet

A phonetician mentioned as a real-life inspiration for Higgins.

George Bernard Shaw

minor

Also known as George

The author of the play, referenced in the endnotes.

Pitman

minor

Inventor of shorthand, referenced in the text.

Milton

minor

The poet John Milton, quoted by Higgins.