Rita meets Frank and after a few minutes she is telling him how erotic the picture is, Frank feels very awkward because Rita says it is pornography and says, “There’s no doubt about it. Look at those tits”. She doesn’t understand the picture yet because she is new to this type of education. Rita swears a lot and she smokes quite often, this shows us per personality and he background. She is leaving her family and friends to come into an unknown world just so that she can become educated.
Frank is an alcoholic but doesn’t want anyone to find out so he hides his drinks behind books in the bookcases and sometimes forgets where he puts them. When Rita gets her cigarettes out she offers Frank one, he says “I don’t smoke – I made a promise not to”, but he still takes one. Frank is quite relaxed but sometimes he can get quite strict with Rita. When Frank offers her a drink she starts talking about how whiskey kills your brain cells.
Over the scene they get to know each other very well but by the end of the scene Frank doesn’t want to teach Rita because he thinks that she doesn’t need to change, she is intelligent in her own way.
In Act 2, Scene 5 Rita is very confident with herself and around others; she even started talking to other students and was late for her lesson. We start to notice real changes on her return from summer school, she has much greater confidence, she understands literature much better and has studied Blake. As her confidence increases Frank’s fears increase. He feels like he is loosing her. Frank looses interest again and starts to drink heavily, this is also because he has many arguments at home. This scene shows the frustration between each other.
At the start of this scene the mood is very light because Rita is really excited about telling Frank about his poems and how good they are but by the end of the scene Rita and Frank have fallen out with each other because they had a massive argument.
When Rita enters the room she asks Frank if he is sober because she wants to tell him how good his poems are. Frank replies, “If you mean am I still this side of reasonable comprehension, then yes”. Rita then explains to Frank how brilliant, witty and profound his poems are but Frank disagrees with her.
Frank gets mad and starts shouting at Rita and Rita tells him that’s he is “Mr self-pitying Piss Artist” and that he can’t bear it that Rita is now educated! At this point the audience probably change they’re mind about Rita and Frank’s personalities or at least how they’re attitudes can change so rapidly. Frank says he will call himself Mary Shelley who wrote “Frankenstein” thus suggesting that he has created a monster in Rita. Rita must realise what her education has given her; choice so finally they can let each other go- Rita to her new life as an educated woman and frank to start again in Australia.
I think Frank gets so mad because he is having a hard time at home with his wife and Rita is putting pressure on him.