Topic 13 - Shared knowledge and absurdist drama (Session A) > Analysing Rita > Task H

Analysing Rita

Task H – Summary

We have not exhausted the kinds of analysis we could have used on this extract. For example, we could have looked in detail at how Rita disrupts Frank in the first few turns, and how her presuppositions and expectations in sentences like ‘It’s sort of like Men Only isn’t it’ (turn 16) and ‘I don’t suppose they would have done if it had been a proper university’ (turn 24). But what we have seen time and time again in this analysis is that Rita behaves consistently in way that goes against our schematic assumptions concerning someone in her position.

It is this large and systematic contrast with our expectations, involving so many aspects of her conversational behaviour that makes the dialogue at the beginning of Educating Rita both striking and amusing. It is not at all surprising that Frank can’t cope with her, and that we feel sympathetic towards him in his plight, as well as laughing at the way Rita turns his world upside down. For the extract we have examined, at least, Educating Rita seems to be an ironic title for Willy Russell’s play.

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