Act 1 scenes 7 & 8: Rita's awakening

Up to this point in the play, we have witnessed a huge change both in Rita and Frank. Frank opened his mind to a totally different world, i.e., teaching an adult from the working class. In this thorough task he had to leave aside lots of prejudices, like going with Rita to see an amateur performance at the local church! :-) He really likes Rita, probably beyond the teacher-student relationship they are supposed to have... but we need to remember that beyond these labels, they are human beings!
As for Rita, she is determined to achieve her goal. She will fight against all odds, even against her husband who she chooses to walk on. She is going through a moment in her life in which she does not know where she belongs to: she feels uneasy drinking beer at the pub with her husband, mother and friends, yet, at the same time, she does not feel ready to interact with "educated" people, such as Frank's wife and friends! This is probably why she could not ring the bell at Frank's house when he invited her for dinner or why she decided to keep on studying despite her husband's opposition. Rita feels moved by her mother's words at the pub while they were singing: "we could sing better songs than those," in a way she can see what her mother means: there is more to life than just conforming to what one already has, there is a moment in which one's urge for knowledge, or self-actualization in Maslow's terms, is stronger than any obstacle one can find in one's way... I simpathise with Rita, I can understand how she feels: I cannot picture life without studying, without satisfying my thirst for knowledge... I would not feel entirely human!

Act 1 scene 6

Rita keeps on trying to find out what the world has to offer. She goes to the theatre on her own and Alas! she loves it! She hasn't chosen any given play, but Macbeth... she's so fascinated with the plot that she wants to write an essay on the play... though first she'll have to stop to think what she wants to say. Rita finds in her own language many expressions to describe how she feels towards the play, words she'd never be able to use in an academic paper! She's so pleased with the world that is unfolding before her that she finds it difficult to explain exactly how she feels...
Her relationship with Frank continues to develop in such a way that she goes to see him on a day she's not supposed to just to tell him about her experience! They're beginnig to trust each other, they even want to spend more time together doing different activities: going for lunch, going to the art gallery and the like. Frank is enthusiastic about Rita's interest in literature and even explains the difference between a tragedy, from the point of view of literature, and a tragic event in real life... Rita takes for granted that "proper" students know all about that... she still looks up to them because they know better than her. But Rita's eagerness to discover this new world takes over her whole self and leads her to explore this world the way a newly-born human being does it...

Act 1 scene 5

Rita begins to be aware what a big change studying entails: little by little she's opening her mind to new experiences, she starts to feel more alive than ever! She's getting to know this new Rita, her "own version of herself..." And she likes it! Though at times she feels selfish about it, she realizes that what she needs now is to be in touch with her new self... Up to now she's behaved in the way everybody expected her to behave, she's worked and after work been to the pub with her husband and family... Rita knows that there's more to life than that and is willing to discover what it is with Frank's help... She continues studying despite Denny's attempt to prevent her from doing so, she feels that nobody can stop her, not even Frank when he invites her to stop talking about Chekhov and go to the pub!! He doesn's realize that what Rita precisely doesn't want is to go on leading the life she's led up to now! She wants to see what there is beyond the pub, what the theatre has to teach her, what authors have to tell her about life, she wants a fresh new start and is determined to pursue her objective...