Pygmalion (play) Pygmalion (play) Pygmalion is a play by George Bernard Shaw, named after a Greek mythological figure. It was first presented on stage to the public in 1913. In ancient Greek mythology, Pygmalion fell in love with one of his sculptures, which then came to life. The general idea of that myth was a popular subject for Victorian era English playwrights, including one of Shaw's influences, W. S. Gilbert, who wrote a successful play based on the story called "Pygmalion and Galatea" that was first presented in 1871. Shaw would also have been familiar with the burlesque version, "Galatea, or Pygmalion
Pygmalion and Galatea (play) said, In 2012, biologist Fred Sander used the play "as a 'hook' to explore the ethics and science of cloning" in his book "Created In Our Own Images.com". Sander wrote: "Gilbert’s drama not only anticipates psychoanalysis in the 20th century, but also, written a hundred years before the discovery of stem cells, it metaphorically resonates with the 21st century of genomic medicine. ... Gilbert's comedy ... points to new biological, psychological, social, and ethical issues raised by the ... sequencing of the genome and the explosion of stem cell research." Pygmalion and Galatea (play) Pygmalion and Galatea, an Original Mythological