One of the play’s major themes is the purposes and nature of education. This extract takes place in
double time, blending in Hector memorial service with Mrs Lintott narrating to the audience the events
that happened to the boys in the years after their education in grammar school. Throughout the play
is Bennett’s exploration in the several categories of education: to what extent is education practically
useful; have the ability to help students pass examinations and be quantifiably successful; to inspire
personal growth and wisdom or on the furthest end of the scale, purely for the outward trappings of
success / ‘league tables’.
Firstly ,in the extract, we see that Mrs Lintott is narrating to the audience, giving prominence to the
role of women in education by having an unusually long mean length of utterance. Even still, she is
struggling to uphold the attention of others, having to question, ‘If I may proceed?’ The use of ‘if’
depicts women’s lack of power and authority, having to patiently wait for attention. This implies a
compliant or submissive stance that was typical for a woman in a male dominated patriarchy.
Similarly, Mrs Lintott’s teaching is not properly congratulated unlike the other male teachers: Hector
and Irwin. Rudge demeans her teaching style as ‘force-fed facts’ and lacking the ‘flavour’ in which the
male teachers do provide. However, in terms of the views of education, Mrs Lintott and Hector share
similar ideas. For example, when Mrs Lintott comments on ‘It’s the pizza that stands out,’ illustrates
her sarcasm for not remembering the education, which is the primary focus of university, but the food.
It demonstrates her valuing of life experiences pairing with Hector who teaches based on life lessons
and not by the school curriculum. He believes ‘All knowledge is precious, whether or not it deserves
the slightest human use.’ This shows they both have the same Aristotelian views: ‘Educating the
mind without educating the heart is no education at all,’ juxtaposing the Headmaster’s view on
education solely for ‘League tables’ and structured by the ‘curriculum’.
The grammar school’s Headmaster cares only about the school’s reputation or perhaps his own
reputation. His personal aspiration of ‘open scholarships’, ‘reports to Governors’ is ironic to the
Headmaster’s own personal academic disappointment as he resentfully notes that he was a
‘geographer. I went to Hull.’ He is a disappointment particularly in comparison to the boys, who are
officially ‘Oxbridge scholarship candidates’. This is clearly reflected in his blunt manner of ‘get me
scholarships’. He is a paradox to Hector and Mrs Lintott, sounding rapacious and arrogant, although
arguably there could be similarities with Irwin, who is likewise focused on results.
In the extract, Irwin is revealed to the audience as ‘a journalist’. This reflects Irwin’s difference in
teaching (as Rudge said, ‘more free-range’) is most noticeably a foil to Hector’s as he teaches the
boys from earlier on in the play, ‘the wrong end of the stick is the right one.’ Irwin teaches the boys
how to play the examination system to impress ‘dons’, mirroring the role of a journalist. However,
despite his immorality and deceitful teaching ideals to cheat, he’s not all a ‘disingenuous’ person.
Bennett purposely allows Irwin’s teaching method to succeed as all eight of the boys achieved their
places at Oxbridge with an addition of Posner getting a scholarship and Dakin an exhibition. Although
perhaps Bennett is using Irwin to symbolise modern education in general, meaning that sometimes,
cheating works and sometimes you have to stand out to be acknowledged and that’s just the way it is
and always has been and will be. But furthermore, Bennett’s deliberate intention of Hector’s death
could reveal Irwin is to blame, to some extent ‘trust Irwin to lean the opposite way to everyone else’
and paired with Irwin's response in the extract that ‘there is no time for his kind of teaching any more.’
Finally Hector, a man of ‘studied eccentricity’, is a paradox to Irwin in that Hector sees examinations
as the ‘enemy of education’. As Mrs Lintott mentions in the extract, Hector teaches the boys
double time, blending in Hector memorial service with Mrs Lintott narrating to the audience the events
that happened to the boys in the years after their education in grammar school. Throughout the play
is Bennett’s exploration in the several categories of education: to what extent is education practically
useful; have the ability to help students pass examinations and be quantifiably successful; to inspire
personal growth and wisdom or on the furthest end of the scale, purely for the outward trappings of
success / ‘league tables’.
Firstly ,in the extract, we see that Mrs Lintott is narrating to the audience, giving prominence to the
role of women in education by having an unusually long mean length of utterance. Even still, she is
struggling to uphold the attention of others, having to question, ‘If I may proceed?’ The use of ‘if’
depicts women’s lack of power and authority, having to patiently wait for attention. This implies a
compliant or submissive stance that was typical for a woman in a male dominated patriarchy.
Similarly, Mrs Lintott’s teaching is not properly congratulated unlike the other male teachers: Hector
and Irwin. Rudge demeans her teaching style as ‘force-fed facts’ and lacking the ‘flavour’ in which the
male teachers do provide. However, in terms of the views of education, Mrs Lintott and Hector share
similar ideas. For example, when Mrs Lintott comments on ‘It’s the pizza that stands out,’ illustrates
her sarcasm for not remembering the education, which is the primary focus of university, but the food.
It demonstrates her valuing of life experiences pairing with Hector who teaches based on life lessons
and not by the school curriculum. He believes ‘All knowledge is precious, whether or not it deserves
the slightest human use.’ This shows they both have the same Aristotelian views: ‘Educating the
mind without educating the heart is no education at all,’ juxtaposing the Headmaster’s view on
education solely for ‘League tables’ and structured by the ‘curriculum’.
The grammar school’s Headmaster cares only about the school’s reputation or perhaps his own
reputation. His personal aspiration of ‘open scholarships’, ‘reports to Governors’ is ironic to the
Headmaster’s own personal academic disappointment as he resentfully notes that he was a
‘geographer. I went to Hull.’ He is a disappointment particularly in comparison to the boys, who are
officially ‘Oxbridge scholarship candidates’. This is clearly reflected in his blunt manner of ‘get me
scholarships’. He is a paradox to Hector and Mrs Lintott, sounding rapacious and arrogant, although
arguably there could be similarities with Irwin, who is likewise focused on results.
In the extract, Irwin is revealed to the audience as ‘a journalist’. This reflects Irwin’s difference in
teaching (as Rudge said, ‘more free-range’) is most noticeably a foil to Hector’s as he teaches the
boys from earlier on in the play, ‘the wrong end of the stick is the right one.’ Irwin teaches the boys
how to play the examination system to impress ‘dons’, mirroring the role of a journalist. However,
despite his immorality and deceitful teaching ideals to cheat, he’s not all a ‘disingenuous’ person.
Bennett purposely allows Irwin’s teaching method to succeed as all eight of the boys achieved their
places at Oxbridge with an addition of Posner getting a scholarship and Dakin an exhibition. Although
perhaps Bennett is using Irwin to symbolise modern education in general, meaning that sometimes,
cheating works and sometimes you have to stand out to be acknowledged and that’s just the way it is
and always has been and will be. But furthermore, Bennett’s deliberate intention of Hector’s death
could reveal Irwin is to blame, to some extent ‘trust Irwin to lean the opposite way to everyone else’
and paired with Irwin's response in the extract that ‘there is no time for his kind of teaching any more.’
Finally Hector, a man of ‘studied eccentricity’, is a paradox to Irwin in that Hector sees examinations
as the ‘enemy of education’. As Mrs Lintott mentions in the extract, Hector teaches the boys
