View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is the Flower Girl selling?
(a) Violets.
(b) Poppies.
(c) Roses.
(d) Daisies.

2. Which character in Pygmalion is based in part on Henry Sweet?
(a) Doolittle.
(b) Higgins.
(c) Neppomuck.
(d) Pickering.

3. What bet does Higgins make with Pickering?
(a) That he can seduce Liza and make her fall in love with him in three months.
(b) That he can pass Liza off as a lady at the ambassador's garden party.
(c) That he can teach Liza to speak perfect English in three weeks.
(d) That Liza will marry the Duke and become a Duchess.

4. What should happen with the spelling of the English language, according to Shaw?
(a) It should be emphasized more in school so that everyone can learn to spell correctly.
(b) It should be made as phonetic as Spanish.
(c) It should be simplified to get rid of silent letters.
(d) Standardized spelling should disregarded as unnecessary; people should simply sound out words and apply the approximate phonetic spelling.

5. What surprises Mrs. Pearce?
(a) Liza has no underwear.
(b) Liza's clothing is torn and dirty.
(c) Liza has only one change of clothing to her name.
(d) Liza never wears pajamas; she sleeps in her underwear.

Short Answer Questions

1. How does Liza feel about the bedroom she'll be staying in?

2. What insulting term does Higgins use to describe Liza in Act 2?

3. What city is the setting of Shaw's play?

4. Of what does Mrs. Pearce warn Higgins?

5. For how long will Liza stay with Higgins as his pupil?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Higgins's housekeeper, Mrs. Pearce, think about the plan? Who seems to have a more sensible view of the situation, Higgins or Mrs. Pearce?

2. Who is the note-taker, and what is he actually doing?

3. What does Higgins do for the Flower Girl? What prompts him to do so? What does this act suggest about Higgins?

4. What makes some English people despise others? What can we infer would solve this problem?

5. What would, in Shaw's opinion, be a prodigious advancement in the English language? Do you agree or disagree? Explain.

6. Who is the Gentleman in the first act, and what do he and the note-taker have in common?

7. Why, according to Shaw, is it important that people be trained scientifically to lose their accents, rather than simply learning by imitation?

8. What does Higgins boast that he can do for the Flower Girl?

9. Why does Liza's father come to see Higgins?

10. Who are some of the most important people in England, according to Shaw? Why do you think this is so, again, according to Shaw?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 881 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample