How Does the Character of Rita Change Throughout Will Russell’s Educating Rita?

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Educating Rita How does the character of Rita change throughout Will Russell’s Educating Rita? The title refers to what happens throughout the education of this woman called Rita. Rita is a lower class woman who is expected very little of. She wants to do something better with herself, so she does something not many women of her class would normally do, get an education. Rita is 26 years old and works as a hairdresser which she doesn’t like for many reasons. One of those reasons is that she has to make small talk. She has a husband called Denny, he is a typical man of that time which means he doesn’t believe in woman having a better job than the man and earning more money so Rita seeking education is something he doesn’t like. The place in which she lives is that of a lower class community. Everybody knows each other and most people think the same as the next person. Rita doesn’t like this. She wants to feel worthy of something instead of being like the crowd. The play is set in the early 1980’s, a time when the working class suffered from recession. To be working class meant to be uneducated and common. Classes were very important in that time. Compared to now classes are not really valued anymore. Everyone is vaguely considered equal. For Rita to be working class and wanting to get an education was very odd. It would be a lot different from today as everybody has the chance to get an education at any time. It’s never too late. In the early 1980’s if you didn’t take your chance in school your chance to get a better education and therefore get a superior job. In act 1 scene 1 the difference between Rita and Frank is easy to see. The author Willy Russell wants it to be an obvious thing to realise because he wants us to know as the audience that different classes are important then. For example “Now you are?” by the way Frank speaks you can tell

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