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Unit 27: Harold Pinter— Introduction to the Author and the Text

• In an earlier work, The Room, a one-act play, Pinter had worked on themes and motifs that he Notes
would carry over into The Birthday Party and some of his succeeding plays.
• Among these themes are the failure of language to serve as an adequate tool of communication,
the use of place as a sanctum that is violated by menacing intruders, and the surrealistic
confusions that obscure or distort fact.
• Directed by Pinter himself, the finished full-length play premiered in Cambridge, England, at
the Arts Theatre, on April 28, 1958. There and on tour in Oxford it was quite successful.
• Pinter would later marvel at the fact that in London the play was completely massacred by
the critics but noted that it was the only maltreatment he had received from reviewers.

27.4 Keywords

Playwright : A person who writes plays. Or The texts of plays that can be read, as distinct
from being seen and heard in performance.
Screenwriter : A person who writes screenplays, especially as an occupation or profession.
Comedies of Menace : A term used to describe the plays of David Campton, Nigel Dennis, N. F.
Simpson, and Harold Pinter by drama critic Irving Wardle, borrowed from
the subtitle of Campton’s play The Lunatic View: A Comedy of Menace, in
reviewing Pinter’s and Campton’s plays in Encore in 1958.
Political Plays : In the history of theatre, there is long tradition of performances addressing
issues of current events and central to society itself, encouraging
consciousness and social change. The political satire performed by the comic
poets at the theatres, had considerable influence on public opinion. Such
plays are known as political plays.
Maltreatment : To treat or handle badly, cruelly, or roughly; abuse.
Memory Plays : A play that focuses on the past as narrated by the main character. Usually,
the play is a dramatic representation of the playwright’s life—or at least
loosely based upon the playwright’s experiences.

27.5 Review Questions

1. Give a brief sketch of birth and early childhood of Harold Pinter.
2. Illustrate that Harold Pinter was an apt screenwriter.
3. Harold Pinter was a superb screenwriter. Illustrate this statement in context of his conferment
of Tony Award and Academy Awards.
4. Explain that The Birthday Party is failure of language to serve as an adequate tool of
communication.
5. Harold Pinter never dimmed his interest in writing even though his play The Birthday Party
was completely massacred by the critics in London. Why?

Answers: Self Assessment

1. (a) 2. (b) 3. oesophageal
4. The Compartment 5. True 6. False
7. (a) 8. (b) 9. The Room
10. Theatre of the Absurd 11. True 12. True.

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