Act 1 - Scenes 7 & 8

In these two scenes, in my opinion, we are clearly presented with a 'growing' Rita since she really shows how her feelings, values and ideas are changing. She is awaking to the fact that, although her husband is totally against her changing into a new life, she is perfectly able to get and achieve that education at which she is aiming. She knows that no matter her age she has already given the first steps into changing her life: she has decided to leave her husband so as to go on with her lessons. She was determined to fight for her dream: 'it was an ultimatum. I explained to him. I didin't get narked or anythin'. I just explained him (Dennis) how I HAD to do this.' However, during scene 7, Rita and Frank have a sort of discussion because of her not going to his dinner party. Trying to make Rita feel better, Frank tells her that he wanted her to be there. He says that people at the party would have seen her as someone funny, delighful and charming... When Rita listens to what Frank tells her, she feels really awful and bad, she feels like an outcast... What she wants is not to be funny, she wants to be taken seriously and be able to take part in their seriuos conversations as if she were one of them. She says: 'I don't wanna spend the night takin' the piss, comin' on with the funnies because that's the only way I can get into the conversation...' She didn't go to Frank's party because of being afraid of being treated as someone who does not fit in, as someone who, no matter how many essays might write, would always go on being from the uneducated part of the society...Rita shows us how she feels about this idea of 'making herself believe that she won't ever be part of the educated people' (mind you! I don't agree with this thought she is showing us in this part of the play because I know that she is much more than a member of the working class; however, I just want to let you know how she feels at this moment) when she says 'But I don't want to be myself. Me? What's me? Some stupid woman who gives us all a laugh because she thinks she can learn, because she thinks that one day she'll be like the rest of them, talking seriously, confidently, with knowledge, livin' a civilized life.' When she finishes saying so, Frank feels terrible and he reminds her why he has invited her: 'You were invited because I wished to have your company...' When I come to think about Rita's reaction and all she says about that dinner, I have to say that I understand her perfectly. She is afraid of facing all those people because of their possible reaction... When she saw them through the window she had the feeling that she couldn't get in because she still sees herself as a member of the working class and not as a member of the well-educated people, i.e. she still feels that there is a very long trace between her and her aim and that's why she couldn't let herself in the house, she still has all those 'prejudices' that all of us have (in the case of Rita she feels that as well as her husband as a member of the working class does not approve of her trying to get a better life she believes that the one that are already members of the well-educated might not be willing to welcome her...) I think that she didn't go to Frank's dinner party because of being afraid of facing those people, being rejected and of not being able to make herself fit in...

Then, regarding Rita's essay on Macbeth, I have to say that, first of all, I loved how Frank decided to change what he was about to do in this lesson. When Rita comes in, Frank closes her essay and starts asking her about the suitcase she's brought. As a teacher he could have act as if nothing unusual has happened and go on with his lesson. However, he completly forgets about Rita's essay and starts talking with her about what has happened and tries to help her. I wanted to remark this attitude of Frank because, as teachers, we are daily faced with different situations in which our students tell us (without uttering a word) that something has happened and that they would love to have someone to talk about it... In this case, Rita's bringing the suitcase shows Frank that something is going on and that Rita might want to talk about it (if she hadn't wanted Frank to know about her moving to her mother's, she wouldn't have brought the case to the lesson) and, after seeing this, the decision of asking her or not is in Frank's hands...And, of course, he decides to go on being the good teacher he is (in my opinion), so he asks her about what's going on...
We don't have to forget how many and how important our decision are and how they will influence our students lives! :)

Finally, and going back to Rita's essay, I wanted to explain why (I think) Frank uses both the adjectives 'worthless' and 'wonderful.' The main reason why he uses this two different words has to do with the 'lens' through which he is evaluating it. On the one hand, when he says that it is worthless it has to do with the 'lens' of the teacher who is correcting an essay in terms of the use of Standard English. On the other hand, when he uses the word wonderful, he refers to his own 'lens' as Frank: the person who is living and watching Rita's improvement and process of becoming the woman she wants to. He says that it is wonderful in 'it's own terms.' He really likes her reaction upon Macbeth, what she feels about it and the fact that she is able to understand it and build her own opinion about it...It is wonderful because it is a clear proof that learning is taking place in her and that she has already started her process of achieving the better life she wants. Although her essay is not still ready to be given a passing mark in a test (a formal one, with teachers following the established standards), it is wonderful for Frank...
After having analised these two scenes, I would say that, throughout them, there is one idea that is always present in some way or another: when Rita didn't go to Frank's dinner party, when she shows that she feels different from the people that went there, when she says that she is a stupid woman, when Frank tells her that he wished to have her company, when he says that the essay is worthless but at the same time wonderful... we are shown that...

'Everything depends on the lens through which each person sees the world.'