The History Boys, when it was first performed in the National Theatre, created a sensation. The play was funny and provocative. It prompted a film version This is the screenplay which was jointly written by Alan Bennett, the playwright, and Nicholas Hytner, the director of the film. The screenplay retains some of the original play’s best moments and lines and is no less enjoyable than the stage version.

The story is set in a minor public school in the north of England. It has a group of seven unusually bright and somewhat cheeky sixth-formers, who have done well in the A-levels and are eager to go up to either Oxford or Cambridge. To the seven is added another student, not too bright but a super rugger player who wants to go up to Christ Church, Oxford. The headmaster sees in the eight his chance to bring some prominence to the school.

The headmaster is obsessed with results and is not quite certain that his staff can produce the results he wants. When the boys come back after their A-levels for special classes to prepare them for Oxbridge, the headmaster recruits a new supply teacher to point the boys in the right direction. The new History teacher, Irwin, is young, smooth and confident whose attitude to learning and teaching is in sharp contrast to the florid and maverick Hector, the English teacher, and the staid but solid Mrs Lintott, who taught them History.

In the conflict between the new teacher and the old ones, Bennett locates the two differing attitudes to teaching and learning. One directed towards results and success, the other emphasizing the opening up of the mind and believing that education is about building a rounded human being. Irwin wants the boys to forget about truth in their exam answers and trains them to say something different, even at times something shocking. The boys, because they are bright, realize that one approach cannot be abandoned for the other. They get into Oxbridge — even the rugger player, much to everybody’s surprise. It transpired that when he went up for his interview at Christ Church, an old and sleeping don had woken up at the mention of his surname, Rudge, and had asked if the boy was related to a Rudge who had been a scout in the college. Rudge was admitted straightaway when he told the don that the erstwhile scout was his father.

Despite the banter and the snappy and unforgettable lines, the play ends on a poignant note which adds to its charm.