Abstract/Statement
Henry Higgins, one of the leads of Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion, has been retrospectively diagnosed as an autistic character by lay readers and two scholars (Rodelle Weintraub, 2006; Sonya Loftis Freeman, 2014). Weintraub’s work is accurate but outdated, and Loftis presents several valid concerns about labelling Higgins an autistic savant, but Henry Higgins should be embraced as a neurodivergent character because today, a decade after the last publication addressing his neurostatus, society has a much more nuanced understanding of autism that can easily make space for his inclusion in the retrospective canon of neurodivergent characters.
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Recommended Citation
Zwart, Abby
(2024)
"Space for the Savant: An Update on Henry Higgins’s Autism,"
Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture: Vol. 5:
Iss.
2, Article 12.
DOI: 10.9707/2833-1508.1167
Available at:
https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/ought/vol5/iss2/12