Educating Rita Transitions

Everyday individuals are faced with challenges that can vary from being big or small. By overcoming these challenges, individuals can be presented with transitions in life that may be confronting, exciting or transformative. In class we have studied the play ‘Educating Rita’ by Willy Russell and the feature article ‘The REAL Sarah Harris’ to provide us with examples of individuals that experience transitions that provide them with growth and change. These transitions allow the individuals to move to a better chapter in life giving them an improved attitude towards the world and themselves.
In Willy Russell’s play ‘Educating Rita’, we as an audience follow the journey that the main female character, Rita, makes to transform herself into an educated woman. When we are introduced to her, we see …show more content…
Symbolism is a key aspect in this play as it used to represent many different things in various ways and aims to highlight Rita’s journey. The door handle to Frank’s office is used as a symbol to describe Rita’s transition. At the beginning of the play Rita is unable to open the door and has to apply an extra amount of force to open it. “It’s that stupid bleedin’ handle on the door”. This symbolises the effort that Rita will have to apply to her learning as she breaks down the first barrier and reaches out for help. At a certain point within the play Rita is caught by Frank trying to oil the door handle. “Hello. I was just oilin’ it for y’.” This shows us her determination to enter the higher social class that Frank is a part of, which contrasts from the situation that Frank places himself in by staying trapped in his own little world. Language is used as a dramatic technique that helps to heavily emphasise the two contrasting characters and helps define moments where Rita changes. In the beginning of the play, Rita uses a lot of slang and colloquial language. Rita uses various words such as “telly”,