Revision

1. Revision ‘Educating Rita’ Willy Russell

2. Characters • Rita What is Rita like? In what way would society react to Rita in 1985? Why does she want to become ‘educated’? How does she change with her ‘education’? What aspects of her ‘self’ does she lose with education? What significant relationships does she have in the text?

3. Characters • Frank What is Frank like as a person? How does he feel about ‘his students’ and in particular Open University students? Why do you think he drinks? Does he enjoy his job? How does Frank change as the play progresses? Does Rita have an impact on this?

4. Setting • Book lined study in a University • Northern England • 1985 • Summer school • Frank’s house

5. Relationships • How do these relationships change/ develop as the play progresses? • Frank & Rita • Rita & Denny • Frank & Julia

6. Themes • Personal relationships • Clash of cultures

7. Language and style • Amusing and entertaining • Speaking different languages: Rita speaks colloquially and Frank in Standard English.

8. Quotations • It was about this old man who runs away from hospital an’ goes out on the ale. He gets pissed an’ stands in the street shoutin’ an’ challengin’ death to come out an’ fight. It’s dead good. • Haven’t ye read it? It’s a fantastic book. D’ y’ wanna lend it? • It’s crap because the fella who wrote it was a louse. • Do it on the radio.

9. Quotations • You’re a crazy mad piss artist who wants to throw his students through the window, an’ I like you. • …to wash away the memory of some silly woman’s attempt to get into the mind of Henry James. • My mind’s full of junk. • Everyone’s pissed, or on the Valium, tryin’ to get from one day to the next.

10. Quotes • Christ – me customer. She only wanted a demi-wave – she’ll come out looking like a friggin’ muppet. • It wouldn’t have mattered if you’d walked in with a bottle of Spanish plonk. • I see him lookin’ at me sometimes, an’ I know what he’s thinkin’, I do y’ know, he’s wonderin’ where the girl he married has gone to. • If she knew I was at the theatre with an irresistible thing like you? Rita, it would be deaf and dumb breakfasts for a week. • You see he goes blindly on and on and with every step he’s spinning one more piece of thread which will eventually make up the network of his own tragedy. • An’ she was cryin’, but no one could get why she was cryin’. Everyone just said she was pissed an’ we should get her home.

11. Quotes • There is not a lot of point in discussing beautiful literature in an ugly voice • I’m havin’ the time of me life • Actually I’m not too familiar with the American poets • A room is like a plant

12. Quotes • They’re young, and they’re passionate about things that matter. They’re not trapped • She spends half her life eatin’ wholefoods an’ health foods to make her live longer, an’ the other half tryin’ to kill herself • I bought it some time ago – for erm – for an educated woman friend – of mine

13. Quotes • It’s the sort of thing that gives publishing a bad name. Wit? You’ll find more wit in the telephone book • For God’s sake, I don’t want to stop coming here. I’ve got to come here. What about my exam? • This clever pyrotechnical pile of self-conscious allusion is worthless, talentless shit and should be recognised as such by anyone with a shred of common sense • I’m gonna take ten years off you

14. Quotes • She’s great. Y’know she’s dead classy. Y’ know like, she’s got taste… • There was this really mad one with them; I’ve only been talking to them for five minutes and he’s inviting me to go abroad with them all • They suggested a sabbatical for a year – or ten…Europe – or America…I suggested that Australia might be more apt – the allusion was lost on them • Or maybe they did it because they’re a bunch of mealy-mouthed pricks who wouldn’t know a poet if you beat them about the head with one