The Theatre of Harold Pinter Author(S): Bernard Dukore Source: the Tulane Drama Review, Vol

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The Theatre of Harold Pinter Author(s): Bernard Dukore Source: The Tulane Drama Review, Vol. 6, No. 3 (Mar., 1962), pp. 43-54 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1124934 Accessed: 07-05-2015 14:44 UTC

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This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions The Theatre of Harold Pinter

By BERNARD DUKORE

The so-calledavant-garde theatre in the United States and England is generallya case of new wine in old bottles.The plays of most of the young Anglo-Americanplaywrights do not break new ground. Edward Albee's The Zoo Story,to begin with one of the betterknown examples, is essentiallya realisticpsychological melodrama. His Sandbox and The AmericanDream utilize conventionsof the traditionalnon-realistic theatre.Jack Gelber's The Connection exploresa segmentof societythat has been previouslyunexplored in the theatreexcept in termsof melodrama, but themanner of presentationgoes back to Pirandello. Jack Richardson bringsto The Prodigal a unique intelligenceand virtuositybut uses familiar techniques.In England as well, thereis vitalitywithin traditional forms.Although John Osborne's observationsof the temperof postwar England are vividlyrealistic, he blazes no new paths of dramaturgy.His charactersare recognizable,not of the English theatre but of English life. His formis recognizable,and of the theatre.Neither the socially- orientatedrealism of Arnold Wesker,the flamboyanceof Bernard Kops and John Arden,or the mixtureof realistnand theatricalityof Brendan Behan and ShelaghDelaney imposegreat difficulties upon audiences.The worksof theseplaywrights reflect traditional practices, either of the realistic or the non-realisticvariety, rather than radical departuresin form. The theatreof Harold Pinter,however, is quite anothermatter. Pinter's theatre,to apply what Jacques Lemarchand said of Ionesco's theatre,is one of the strangesttypes of theatreto have emergedduring the atomic age. It is certainlyone of the most bizarreand unique to have emerged in the English language. The only other playwrightwhose plays seem similarin textureis Samuel Beckett,and his major plays were originally writtenin French. Pinter'splays are frequentlyfunny. They are also frequentlyfrighten- ing. Their meaning usually seems obscure.They are realisticplays, after a fashion,but not realisticin the sense thatRoots or Look Back in Anger is realistic.The charactersbehave in a "believable" manner,but theyare shrouded in a twilightof mystery.We are never preciselysure who they are, whythey are there,or what theyhave come to do. Their motivesand backgroundsare vague or unknown.We recognizethat thereis motiva- 43

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 44 The Tulane Drama Review tion, but we are unsure what it is. We recognize that there is a back- ground, but that backgroundis clouded. Each piece of knowledge is a half-knowledge,each answer a springboard to new questions. In The Room, it is nevercompletely explained whya blind Negro named Riley comes to visit Rose Hudd, what his message to her means, or even why Bert Hudd, Rose's husband, kills him. In The BirthdayParty, we never reallyknow whythe strangevisitors, Goldberg and McCann, intimidate Stanleyor whythey take him away with them.In The Caretaker,we do not know the preciserelationship of the brothersor even the reasons for the younger brother'schanging attitudes toward their visitor,Davies. In The Dumb Waiter,we do not know the reasons Gus and Ben have been hired to do theirjob. Yet at the same timewe accept Riley's need to deliverhis messageand Bert Hudd's need to kill him; we accept the fact that Goldberg and McCann must do somethingto Stanley;we accept as logical the youngerbrother's treatment of Davies; and we accept the factthat Gus and Ben have been hired to do a job. Pinter'splays are not constructedin the familiarIbsenite fashion,and yet theyhave a recognizable beginning,middle, and end. His charactersare recognizablehu- man beings who seem to behave according to valid psychologicaland sociologicalmotives, and yet there is somethingbizarre about theirvery reality.They seem to be "real" people, for theirspeech, their concerns, theirbehavioral patterns, and theirrhythms of daily livinghave the ring of truthto them.But it is the details of living and the individual sections of dialogue which have this ring of truth,not the overall patternitself. They exist within the given frameworkof the play, and their overall pattern of realityis the bizarre world of the play. Pinter seems to be makinga statementabout life and the world we live in, but at the same time he seemsto be sayingsomething merely about a grotesqueworld of his own creation.Pinter's plays are obviouslysymbolic, but theyare unlike otherplays which we have come to associate with symbolism.Unlike the plays of, say, Maeterlinck,the charactersare part of a recognizable world of social forcesand class values. They do not functionsolely as symbols.Unlike the symbolicelements in the plays of, say,Ibsen, symbol and realityare not fused to the point that each clarifiesand reinforces the other.No symbolfunctions in Pinter'splays as does, forexample, the orphanage in Ghostsor the pistols in Hedda Gabler. In brief,the refer- entsare vague. The objects,-thecharacters, and the behaviorof the char- acterssymbolize something, but we are neverquite sure what that "something"is. Ibsen carefullyand clearlyrelates his symbolsto plot, character, and theme:he methodicallycrosses his t's and dots his i's. Pinter uses his

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions BERNARD DUKORE 45 symbolsin as carefula manneras Ibsen, but he methodicallyleaves his t's uncrossedand his i's undotted. Pinter's plays have an unreal reality,or a realisticunreality. His symbols are unclear but pertinent,or pertinentbut unclear.This description mightmake theseplays seem dull and pretentious.But theyare not: they are engrossingand exciting.A neoclassicalcritic would have no difficulty judging Pinter's theatre: "He does not write according to the Rules." Our currentlyfashionable phrases--"These aren't plays: they'resketches forrevues" or "I don't know what the hell this play is all about"--come to the same thing.Pinter's plays seem to be productsby Maxim Gorky out of Charles Addams with Samuel Beckett as midwife.He has been called an egg-headHitchcock, and his plays have given rise to a new label, "Comedyof Menace," a termwhich is appropriate,which explains little,but which servesas a convenientlabel forpeople who need labels. The plots of Pinter'splays are straightforwardalmost to the point of simplicity.A recountingof the plot of The Caretakerleads one to expect the type of treatmentfound in Kind Lady. Davies, a filthyold bum, is rescued froma fightin a cafe by Aston,who takeshim to his house and giveshim lodginguntil he will be able to move on. Aston'syounger brother, Mick, appears, and each-separately--offersDavies a position as caretakerof the house. Davies triesto play one brotheragainst the other, attemptingto establishhimself permanently in the house. Finally, the tables are turned and both brothersreject him. The storiesof Pinter's other plays are no more complicated,and, in fact,the storylines are, in theirbarest forms, quite conventional.In The BirthdayParty, Goldberg and McCann visit a lodging house in a seaside resorttown, where they drive Stanley Webber, a lodger, to a nervous breakdown,and finally abduct him. In The Dumb Waiter,two hired killers, Gus and Ben, arrive in Birminghamto do a job. When Gus leaves to go to the lavatory,Ben receives instructionsfrom someone talking to him on a speaking-tube, and Gus returnsto findBen pointinga gun at him. In The Room, a blind Negro named Riley has been waitingin the basementuntil Rose Hudd's husband Bert leaves forwork. When Bert leaves,Riley tellsRose thather fatherwants her to come home. Bert returnsand killshim. These plays are often as frighteningas Hitchcock'sfilm Psycho. The scenes in The BirthdayParty wherein Goldberg and McCann intimidate Stanleyare horrifying.At the end of The Room, when Bert Hudd strikes the blind Negro,kicks his head againstthe gas stoveuntil he is dead, and when Rose immediatelyclutches her eyes and cries out that she cannot see, the resultis positivelyblood-curdling. Pinter does not alwaysrely on

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 46 The Tulane Drama Review physicalviolence to produce the sinister.He frequentlyachieves it in the mostchillingly quiet manner,as in The Room: ROSE.YOU won't find any rooms vacant in thishouse.... MR.SANDS. The man in the basement said there was one. One room. Num- ber sevenhe said. ROSE.That's this room.*

But even more frequently,Pinter's plays are uproariouslyfunny. Oc- casionally,the humoris in the formof the simple "gag," as in the following dialogue from The Birthday Party. STANLEY.How long has that tea been in the pot? MEG.It's good tea. Good strongtea. STANLEY.This isn't tea. It's gravyl Usually,however, the humorarises fromPinter's acute perceptionof the rhythmsand nuancesof contemporaryspeech. In The Room, forexample, Rose is interruptedwhile she is talkingto her husband. A knock at the door. She stands. Who is it? Pause. Hallol Knock repeated. Come in then. Knock repeated. Who is it? Pause. The door opens and MR.KIDD comes in. MR. KIDD. I knocked.

Pinterhas a sharpear forauthentic and flavorfuldialogue. The following occurs in The Birthday Party. MEG.Is Stanley up yet? PETEY.I don't know. Is he? MEG.I don'tknow. I haven'tseen him down yet. PETEY.Well then, he can't be up. But most important,Pinter's charactersreflect the tensions and the attitudesof present-dayEngland. The playwrightmoves them through highlyinventive and bizarre theatricalpatterns, but theyunmistakably reflecta recognizablelife of the world beyond the stage doors. They are * Quotations from The Birthday Party, The Room, and The Dumb Waiter are fromHarold Pinter,The BirthdayParty and otherplays (London: Methuen, 1960).Quotations from The Caretakerare fromHarold Pinter,The Caretaker (London: Methuen,1960).

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions BERNARD DUKORE 47 not"stage commoners," but are replicas of lower-class Englishmen as they existtoday, whose attitudes and valuesare ofthe world we livein. When Daviescomplains that he couldnot find a seatat thecafe because a pack offoreigners had takenthem, when he complainsthat some Indian neigh- bors--"themBlacks"-are using the same lavatory that he uses,and when Rose Hudd insultsthe blindNegro, "I wouldn'tknow you to spit on, not froma mileoff," there is theshock of recognition.This is theEng- land of today,no longerthe great colonial power. These are thelower- classEnglishmen of today,no longerable to lordit overand relievetheir aggressionson minoritygroups. When Davies complains, "I've eatenmy dinneroff the best of plates.But I'm not youngany more. I remember thedays I was as handyas anyof them.They didn'ttake any liberties withme. But I haven'tbeen so well lately.I've had a fewattacks," we recognizenot onlythe old man whosepowers have failed,but also the old Englandwhose powers have failed.When the twohired killers dis- cussthe events of the day in thenewspaper-the "human interest" stories ofcolorfully ordinary people involved in death-we recognizeour neigh- bors(but certainlynot ourselves).When the lodging-houseowners dis- cusswhether a titledlady's new child is a boyor a girl,when an unkempt youngman is toldby an overly-kemptyoung lady that he shouldshave, and whensuch familiar items as the darningof socks,the cleaningof sheets,and thelighting of a stoveare discussedwith thefervor of a Geneva armamentsconference, there is recognition. But thisshock of recognitionthat we findin Pinter'splays is not only a matterof isolated details. It is not only a matterof realisticdialogue or of idiosyncraticbehavior. The verytexture and tone of these plays is the textureand toneof the worldwe live in. Pinterpaints a varietyof pictures of modernman beaten down by the world around him, of man reduced and of man in the processof being reduced to a cipher in the vast social structure.He showspeople reduced to nonentities,and he showspeople fightingin vain against being so reduced. It will doubtless be said that Pinter's plays are variationsof the familiartheme in modern drama of man's failure to communicatewith other men. This is only partially true.Pinter's people do not fail to communicate:they avoid communicat- ing. They are afraid of exposing themselves,afraid of revealing themselves.Some are afraidof revealingtheir individuality; some are afraidof revealingtheir loss of individuality. Pinter's people isolate themselves.They live in a closed, womblike environment.They keep to themselvesas if theyare afraidto go outside their littleworld, afraid that their ordinariness, ineptness, or sheerempti- ness will be seen and exposed in all of its nakedness.In The Birthday

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Party,Stanley tells McCann that all the yearshe lived at Basingstoke,he neverstepped outsidethe door. When Lulu triesto get him to go outside with her, he hedges until he finallyrefuses. In The Room, Rose Hudd confessesthat she and her husband keep strictlyto themselvesin their room, and never botheranyone else. They do not even know how many floorsthere are in thehouse theylive in. The blind Negro who visitsRose, and her sudden blindness,serve as symbolsof thisapartness and isolation. In The Catetaker,Davies' loss of individual identityis complete.He has forgottenwhere he was born. Even his label of identificationis false, for he is going under an assumed name. His identificationpapers are elsewhere,and he is lost without them,for he has no identitywithout them: "They prove who I am! I can't mote withoutthem papers. They tell you who I am. You see! I'm stuck without them." He avoids going to Sidcup, wherehe claims to have lefthis papers,and makes all sortsof excusesnot to go, forhe is eitherafraid of findingthat he has no individual identity,or else he does not rememberwhere he lost his identification papers (wherehe lost his identity)and is lyingabout Sidcup. Davies tries to finda place forhimself in the house of Aston and Mick, but by the end of the play,rejected and alone, he is more isolated than ever. Davies of The Catetaker,Meg Boles of The BirthdayParty, Ben of The Dumb Waiter,and Rose and Bert Hudd of The Room have been reduced to ciphers.Their lives are composed of platitudes and stale cliches. They are used to taking orders,of buying the food and cosmeticsthat are advertised,of evaluatingpeople and ideas as the newspaperstell themto, and of gaining identityby attachingthemselves to objects and by taking out theiraggressions on "inferiorpeoples." They avoid coming to terms withthemselves, partly because it rarelyoccurs to themto tryto do so, and partlybecause they are afraid that if theydo so theywill find no self withwhom to come to terms.They are frightenedof exposingthemselves. Davies, for example, is afraid of revealinghimself in his dreams.When Aston tells him that he was making noises in his sleep, he immediately proteststhat he was not dreamingand thathe has neverhad a dream in his life.And when he suggeststhat Aston may have been dreamingit, the latter replies curtly,"I don't have dreams." Davies is alone and afraid. He triesto ingratiatehimself with Aston and withMick by assumingthe identityhe thinksthe other wants of him. He accommodateshimself to whateverthe other may wish. Coming upon a smallstatue which he has to be told is a Buddha, he is noncommittaluntil he learns that Aston likes it; at whichpoint he agrees.Davies is ashamed of revealinghis ignorance, and attemptsto ingratiatehimself with the other,to make theother think he has similarknowledge and attitudes.

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ASTON. I thinkI'll takea strolldown the road. A little... kindof a shop. Man there'dgot a jig saw theother day. I quite likedthe look of it. DAVIES.A jig saw, mate? ASTON.Yes. Could be veryuseful. DAVIES. Yes. Slightpause. What'sthat then, exactly, then? ASTONwalks up to the window and looks out. ASTON.A jig saw?Well, it comesfrom the same family as thefret saw. But it'san appliance,you see. You haveto fix it on to a portabledrill. DAVIES.Ah, that's right. They're very handy. ASTON.They are, yes. Pause. DAVIES.What about a hack-saw? ASTON.Well, I've gota hack-saw,as a matterof fact. DAVIES.They're handy. ASTON. Yes. Pause. So's a keyholesaw. DAVIES.Ah. Pause. Yes, there'sno gettingaway from that. I mean,I knowthat, I know they'revery handy. As longas yougot the feel how to use it. Pause. On theother hand, they wouldn't ... theywouldn't be as handyas a hack-saw,though, would they? ASTON,turning to him.Wouldn't they? DAVIES.I mean, I'm onlysaying that from.., .from what I've comeacross of them,like.

Pinter carefullybut unobtrusivelymakes his details reinforcethis picture of man crushed into nonentity.His people are enveloped by darkness.The room in The Caretakeris dark and womblike.The two hiredkillers in The Dumb Waiterwill not be able to go into the sunshine until theyfinish their job, at whichpoint theywill have to leave townand wait by the telephoneuntil theyget anotherjob. In The BirthdayParty, Stanleydoes not ventureforth into the lightof the sun. He staysinside, in his pyjamas, all day. In The Room, the room itself is dark--even darker than outside, one of the characterspoints out-but in the base- mentit is pitchblack. Finally,darkness envelops Rose: she becomesblind. These charactersare isolated fromother human beings.In The Caretaker, the otherrooms in the house are out of commission,and the basementis closed. Mr. Kidd, the landlord of The Room, does not know how many floorsthere are in the house. Moreover,these people are isolated from

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theirpast, for theirmemories are faulty.They lose track-even, as with Davies, of where theywere born. To emphasize the point still further, Pinter's plays abound with symbolsof non-connection.Davies is fright- ened by the unconnectedgas stove: frightenedbecause it may be con- nected. Aston tries to put in workable,connectable order an electric plug-but he cannot fixthe plug. Pinter writesnot only about the man who has been crushed by the weightof the social world into a conformingnonentity, but about the man who resistsbeing crushed.This man may be a rebel, an artist,or simplya questioner.But sooner or later, he is either crushed into con- formityor else he is killed. Aston, in The Caretaker,has--literally!- been operated on and renderedharmless. At one time,he used to talk to people willingly.Then, he could see thingsvery clearly, and spoke to his fellow-workersabout his visions. But this proved to be dangerous. One day he was removed to a hospital outside London, where he was questioned by the authoritiesand finallytold that theyhad decided to operate on his brain. Once theyperformed this operation,he was told, he would be able to leave "and live like the others." He struggled,but theyoverpowered him, put pincerson his skull,and performedthe brain operation.Because he resistedwhile the operationwas being performed, his spine may have been damaged. Afterthe operation,he was dismissed fromthe hospital. He no longer speaks to people. He avoids them,and cannot rememberwhat were the visions he had spoken of before the operation. He regretsthe operation,but is unable to do anythingabout it: "I've oftenthought of going back and tryingto findthe man who did thatto me. But I want to do somethingfirst. I want to build thatshed out in the garden." Here is the one-timesocial rebel whom societyhas- literallyand figuratively-renderedimpotent. The Dumb Waiter presentstwo people, one who simply--dumbly- accepts,the otherwho suffersand questions.The lattermust be stopped. Gus alwaysquestions, always triesto findout "Why." Ben not only does not question, it does not even occur to him to do so. When he reads a newspaper storyabout a man who crawled under a stationarytruck whichstarted and ran overhim, Gus askswho advisedhim to do so. When Ben recountsa newspaperreport of a girl of eight killing a cat, Gus in- quires how she did it. The surprisedBen returnsto the paper to findthe answer.He does not findit, but the statementthat her brotherwatched her do it satisfieshim completely.Gus wondersabout thingswith which Ben never concerns himself.He wonders why no one ever complains about the noise when theyshoot someone, why they never see anyone ex- cept theirvictim, and who cleans up afterthey leave. Ben is contentwith

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions BERNARD DUKORE 51 the "explanation" that the organizationthey work for has other depart- mentswhich handle this sort of thing.Ben has no identityother than his job, his function.His existence is determinedby his functionas a non-individualizedcog in a largermachine. He takes orders.He accepts the role into which he has been placed. When notes come down on the dumb-waiterdemanding various sortsof food, ordinaryand exotic, it is Ben who becomesdesperate because theydo not have the food demanded of them,and it is he who decides to send up some food-any food, all the food theyhave. He has been given an order,a job to do, and he must do it. When, afternumerous requests for food, Gus grabs the speaking- tube near the dumb-waiterand yells,"The larder's bare!" Ben, panic- stricken,grabs it fromhim and, "Speaking withgreat deference,"apolo- gizes profusely.Ben is annoyed at being questioned about the routine they are caught in. BEN.What's the matter with you? You're always asking me questions. What's the matterwith you? GUs. Nothing. BEN. YOUnever used to ask me so manydamn questions. What's come over you? GUS.No, I was just wondering. BEN. Stopwondering. You've got a job to do. Whydon't you just do it and shut up? Ben is a dumb waiter.Gus, on the otherhand, mightrebel. Gus mustbe put out of the way. When, at the end of the play, Gus returnsfrom the lavatoryto be confrontedwith Ben pointing a gun at him, we see the resultof questioningthe patternedmovements of the orderlyscheme of things. It is the artist,however, who by the very nature of his profession seeks individual self-expressionand who is thereforea threat to the societyaround him. The subjectionof the artistby the pressuresof con- formityis the chiefconcern of The BirthdayParty. In this play, Pinter paints a frighteningpicture of the individual pressuredby the forcesof society to the point wherein he loses his individualityand becomes a druggedmember of the social machine.In The Caretaker,a rebel to the social order was renderedimpotent. In The Dumb Waiter,a dissatisfied man who questioned his patternof existencewas killed. In The Birthday Party,the individualist,the threatto the establishedsocial pattern,is an artist.As the rebel in The Caretakerwas operated on so that he lost his vision of a brave new world,as the hired killerof The Dumb Waiterwas killed by his fellowkiller, so does the artistof The BirthdayParty receive a similarlyappropriate fate: he loses his powersof expression.

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StanleyWebber was once a pianist."I had a unique touch,"he tells us. "Absolutelyunique." When he gave a concert,this unique touch proved to be disastrous.

They carvedme up. Carvedme up. It was all arranged,it was all worked out. My nextconcert. Somewhere else it was. In winter.I wentdown there to play.Then, when I gotthere, the hall wasclosed, the place wasshuttered up, noteven a caretaker.They'd locked it up.... All right,Jack, I can take a tip.They want me to crawldown on mybended knees.

Stanleyhas hidden out in a lodginghouse in a seaside resort,attempting to keep in isolation the individualitythat remains to him, attemptingto escape crawlingon his bended knees. Goldberg and McCann, two mem- bers of an unidentifiedorganization, find him. The organizationis society,and theyare organizationmen who mustmold him into the collec- tive pattern.Their dialogue is occasionallya parodyof corporatejargon. When McCann asks Goldberg whetherthe job they have come to do resemblesanything they have done previously,the latter replies crisply and efficiently,"The main issue is a singular issue and quite distinct fromyour previous work. Certain elements,however, might well approxi- mate in points of procedureto some of yourother activities."McCann is satisfiedby thisexplanation. Goldbergand McCann are exactlythe right people for this particular job, for they are representativesof the two traditionalreligions of Western civilization,Judaism and Catholicism. It would be highlyinappropriate to send a Protestantto make Stanley conform,but Goldberg and McCann, representativesand symbolsof traditionand conformity,demonstrate the use that societymakes of the forcesof religionto insurethe conformityof itsmembers. Each has several given names, and these carry connotationsof tradition and religion. McCann is sometimescalled Dermot (Diarmaid) and sometimesSeamus (James); Goldberg is now called Nat (Nathan), but his wife used to call him Simey (Simon or Simeon), and his fathercalled him Benny (Ben- jagnin);and Goldberghas a son named Emmanuel whomhe calls Timmy. Their nameschange according to thefunction they perform. For example, although Goldberg's fathercalled him Benny (Benjamin was Jacob's youngestson and the favoriteof his old age), he is in his presentcapacity called Nat, and just as Nathan the Prophet,commanded directly by God, rebuked King David for having sinned against the Lord, and brought him back to the paths of righteousness,so does Nat, commandeddirectly by his organization,bring Stanley back to the paths of conformity.While Goldberg supplies the brains, McCann supplies the muscle (the Church Militant),and at one point the latterexhorts a young lady to get down

This content downloaded from 61.129.42.30 on Thu, 07 May 2015 14:44:27 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions BERNARD DUKORE 53 on her knees and confess.Goldberg's speeches are filledwith the cliches of the ideals of middle-classconformity. "What's happened to the love, the bonhomie,the unashamed expressionof affectionof the day before yesterday,that our mums taughtus in the nursery?"he rhetoricallyasks. Later in the play,he confidesto McCann the secretof his successin life: Play up, playup, and play thegame. Honour thy father and thymother. All along the line. Follow the line, the line, McCann,and you can't go wrong.What do you think,I'm a self-mademan? Nol I sat whereI was told to sit.... Do yourduty and keep yourobservations. Always bid good morningto theneighbours. Never, never forget your family, for they are the rock,the constitution and the corel When they go to work on Stanley, they intimidate him in the most frighteningmanner, attemptingto crush the smallestdegree of self-re- spect and dignitythat Stanley may have, callinghim a leper,a plague, an overthrow,and threateningto sterilizehim. They bringall of theirforces to crush him.

GOLDBERG.Do you recognisean externalforce? MCCANN.That's the questionl GOLDBERG.Do you recognise an externalforce, responsible for you, suffering foryou? STANLEY.It's late. GOLDBERG.Late! Late enough!When did you last pray? MCCANN.He's sweating! GOLDBERG.When did you last pray? MCCANN.He's sweating! Finally, they do crush Stanley and rob him of his individual identity. When Stanleyfirst appears, he is a dirty,unshaven young man dressed in his pyjamas,paying no attentionto conventionalcodes of dress and personal appearance. By the time Goldberg and McCann are through with he him, is stripped of his identityand has become a department. storedummy, in a uniformthat makes him indistinguishablefrom others. When he entersin the thirdact, he "is dressedin stripedtrousers, black jacket, and white collar. He carriesa bowler hat in one hand and his broken in the glasses other.He is clean-shaven."Now that Goldberg and McCann have forced upon him the outward signs of conformity,they can "save" him. Now, Goldberg tellshim, "You'll be adjusted.... You'll be integrated."Now, Stanleyis totallydefeated. STANLEYconcentrates, his mouthopens, he attemptsto speak, fails and emitssounds from his throat. STANLEY.Uh-gug ... uh-gug... eeehhh-gag...

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He cannot speak. He has lost his power of self-expression,as he has sur- rendered the self which he had to express.Stanley has had a birthday party:a new Stanleyhas been born. In order for the new Stanleyto be born,the spiritof the old Stanleyfirst had to be killed. This, then,is the theatreof Harold Pinter.It is a pictureof contempo- raryman beaten down by the social forcesaround him. It is a pictureof man withoutidentity and withoutindividuality, of man crushed into a rigid social mold. It is a horrifyingpicture of contemporarylife. It is a pictureof the powerlessnessof modernman, and the plays are frighten- ing. It-isa pictureof the absurdityof the human conditionin our world, and the plays are comic. But beneath the laughterand overpoweringthe laughter,there is a cryof despair froma well of human hopelessness.

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