English accents aren't what they used to be

"Pygmalion is returning to the London stage in a production for the Old Vic by Peter O'Toole... . Pygmalion is, however, a melancholy reminder that phonetically, England is not the place it once was", writes Melanie McDonagh. "The first Act has a brilliant scene in which Henry Higgins is surrounded by an angry crowd and identifies in turn exactly where the people who address him come from. ... Is there any place where such a feat would still be possible ? Certainly not London, where the accents of Hoxton, Earl's Court and Lisson Grove are indistinguishable... . Of course, the old bores in linguistics departments will maintain that English is a vibrant, ever-changing language. So it is. But the fact that the multifarious accents of [George Bernard] Shaw's time - including his own Protestant Irish diction - have disappeared ... is a change for the worse."

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