Page 325 - DENG403_BRITISH_DRAMA

Unit 28: The Birthday Party: Detailed Analysis of the Text

Notes

Illustrate the parallelism of scenes in Act I and Act II.

Self Assessment

Multiple Choice Questions:
1. Which of the following is not true about The Birthday Party?
(a) It was a tragedy
(b) It was Harold Pinter’s first commercially-produced play
(c) Harold Pinter began writing The Birthday Party after acting in a theatrical tour
(d) The play was heavily criticized by the reviewers.
2. Who is described disheveled and unshaven in the Act I?
(a) McCann (b) Stanley
(c) Meg (d) Petey.
Fill in the blanks:
3. McCann, at the living room table, methodically tears Petey’s ...... into strips.
4. Through the hatch, Meg explains that Goldberg and McCann had eaten all the ...... .
State whether the following statements are true or false:
5. On hearing the news of arrival of two new visitors, Stanley appears concerned, suspicious,
and disbelieving.
6. Paralleling the first scene of the play, Petey is having breakfast, and Meg asks him innocuous
questions, with important differences revealing the details of the party.
7. The nearly unanimous negative reviews that assaulted the 1958 London premier of Pinter’s
The Birthday Party baffled him and dampened his spirits of writing.

28.4 Summary

• Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party, was the playwright’s first commercially-produced, full-
length play. He began writing the work after acting in a theatrical tour, during which, in
Eastbourne, England, he had lived in filthy insane digs. The flophouse became the model for
the rundown boarding house of the play and the woman and her tenant the models,
respectively, for the characters of Meg Boles and Stanley Webber.
• The criticism of the 1958 London premier of Pinter’s The Birthday Party baffled the young
playwright but never dampened his spirits.
• The Birthday Party opens in the living-dining area of a seedy rooming house at an unnamed
seaside resort in England. Petey and Meg Boles, the proprietors, converse while she prepares
his breakfast and he reads the newspaper.
• While Meg prepares to serve her husband Petey breakfast, Stanley, described as a man in his
late thirties, who is disheveled and unshaven, enters from upstairs.
• It is evening of the same day. McCann, at the living room table, methodically tears Petey’s
newspaper into strips. Stanley enters and begins a polite conversation. When McCann mentions
the birthday party, Stanley insists that he wants to celebrate alone, but McCann says that, as
the guest of honor, Stanley cannot skip out on it.
• It is early the next morning. As before, Petey sits at the table reading the newspaper. Through
the hatch, Meg explains that Goldberg and McCann had eaten all the breakfast food. She
enters to pour Petey some tea and spots Stanley’s present, broken and discarded in the fireplace.

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