This scene with Frank and Rita is a key moment in the play. When Rita first came to Frank, she asked a lot of questions that were not about anything of much importance, which she explained to Frank as what she did when she was nervous. This is the main reason that Rita came to Frank, to get away from all of that idol chat at the hairdressers, so she could hold proper conversations with people, and not be caught up in worthless banter that she has been surrounded by all her life. As Frank says in the play, she is trying to "Find a better song to sing".
             In this scene, we see Frank at his desk with yet another mug of whisky, not a glass, but a mug which shows the signs o a substantial drinker. Rita does not like to speak to him when he is drunk, so she asks, "Are you sober?"
             Frank comes back with his usual sharp and witty comments, and because he insists that e is not drunk she continues the conversation with him. Rita had come for a reason, to compliment Frank on his poetry and to try and convince him to start to write again, but Frank thinks that his work is a
             " Pyrotechnical, self conscious allusion"
             he also refers to it as a "Worthless piece of *censored*"
             This shows that Frank is in a state of refutation, meaning that he is depressed and doesn't really care about anything anymore, he has lived his life, got to the top of his profession, and there isn't really much more for him to do, apart from drink. Rita tries to tell him that her friend Trish, that she had recently moved in with, also thought that the poems were of a high standard and it was;
             " More resonant than purely contemporary poetry, you can see in it a direct line through to nineteenth century traditions of – of like wit and classical allusion"
             Even that did not seem to move Frank in the slightest. He just took the papers, and ripped them into shreds, and just casually tossed them ...