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Harold Pinter (; 10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British
playwright A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes plays. Etymology The word "play" is from Middle English pleye, from Old English plæġ, pleġa, plæġa ("play, exercise; sport, game; drama, applause"). The word "wright" is an archaic English ...
,
screenwriter A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based. ...
, director and
actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), lit ...
. A
Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...
winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramatists with a writing career that spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include '' The Birthday Party'' (1957), '' The Homecoming'' (1964) and '' Betrayal'' (1978), each of which he adapted for the screen. His screenplay adaptations of others' works include '' The Servant'' (1963), ''
The Go-Between ''The Go-Between'' is a novel by L. P. Hartley published in 1953. His best-known work, it has been adapted several times for stage and screen. The book gives a critical view of society at the end of the Victorian era through the eyes of a naï ...
'' (1971), '' The French Lieutenant's Woman'' (1981), '' The Trial'' (1993) and ''
Sleuth Sleuth may refer to: *Detective *Sleuth, collective noun for a group of bears Computing * The Sleuth Kit, a collection of forensic analysis software *SLEUTH assembler language for the UNIVAC 1107 Entertainment and media *Cloo Cloo (stylized ...
'' (2007). He also directed or acted in radio, stage, television and film productions of his own and others' works. Pinter was born and raised in Hackney, east London, and educated at
Hackney Downs School Hackney Downs School was an 11–16 boys, community comprehensive secondary school in Lower Clapton, Greater London, England. It was established in 1876 and closed in 1995. It has been replaced by the Mossbourne Community Academy. History ...
. He was a sprinter and a keen cricket player, acting in school plays and writing
poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meani ...
. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art but did not complete the course. He was fined for refusing
national service National service is the system of voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. The ...
as a conscientious objector. Subsequently, he continued training at the Central School of Speech and Drama and worked in repertory theatre in Ireland and England. In 1956 he married actress Vivien Merchant and had a son, Daniel, born in 1958. He left Merchant in 1975 and married author Lady Antonia Fraser in 1980. Pinter's career as a playwright began with a production of '' The Room'' in 1957. His second play, '' The Birthday Party'', closed after eight performances but was enthusiastically reviewed by critic Harold Hobson. His early works were described by critics as " comedy of menace". Later plays such as '' No Man's Land'' (1975) and '' Betrayal'' (1978) became known as " memory plays". He appeared as an actor in productions of his own work on radio and film, and directed nearly 50 productions for stage, theatre and screen. Pinter received over 50 awards, prizes and other honours, including the
Nobel Prize in Literature ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , caption = , awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature , presenter = Swedish Academy , holder = Annie Ernaux (2022) , location = Stockholm, Sweden , year = 1901 , ...
in 2005 and the French
Légion d'honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...
in 2007. Despite frail health after being diagnosed with oesophageal cancer in December 2001, Pinter continued to act on stage and screen, last performing the title role of Samuel Beckett's one-act monologue '' Krapp's Last Tape'', for the 50th anniversary season of the Royal Court Theatre, in October 2006. He died from
liver cancer Liver cancer (also known as hepatic cancer, primary hepatic cancer, or primary hepatic malignancy) is cancer that starts in the liver. Liver cancer can be primary (starts in liver) or secondary (meaning cancer which has spread from elsewhere to th ...
on 24 December 2008.


Biography


Early life and education

Pinter was born on 10 October 1930, in Hackney, east London, the only child of British Jewish parents of Eastern European descent: his father, Hyman "Jack" Pinter (1902–1997) was a ladies' tailor; his mother, Frances (née Moskowitz; 1904–1992), a housewife.Harold Pinter, as quoted in Gussow, ''Conversations with Pinter'' 103. Pinter believed an aunt's erroneous view that the family was
Sephardic Sephardic (or Sephardi) Jews (, ; lad, Djudíos Sefardíes), also ''Sepharadim'' , Modern Hebrew: ''Sfaradim'', Tiberian: Səp̄āraddîm, also , ''Ye'hude Sepharad'', lit. "The Jews of Spain", es, Judíos sefardíes (or ), pt, Judeus sefa ...
and had fled the Spanish Inquisition; thus, for his early poems, Pinter used the pseudonym ''Pinta'' and at other times used variations such as ''da Pinto''.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 1–5. Later research by Lady Antonia Fraser, Pinter's second wife, revealed the legend to be apocryphal; three of Pinter's grandparents came from Poland and the fourth from Odessa, so the family was Ashkenazic.For some accounts of the significance of Pinter's Jewish background, see Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 2, 40–41, 53–54, 79–81, 163–64, 177, 286, 390, 429. Cf. ; Woolf, as quoted in Merritt, "Talking about Pinter" 144–45; Pinter's family home in London is described by his official biographer Michael Billington as "a solid, red-brick, three-storey villa just off the noisy, bustling, traffic-ridden thoroughfare of the Lower Clapton Road".Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 2. In 1940 and 1941, after
the Blitz The Blitz was a German bombing campaign against the United Kingdom in 1940 and 1941, during the Second World War. The term was first used by the British press and originated from the term , the German word meaning 'lightning war'. The Germa ...
, Pinter was evacuated from their house in London to
Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a Historic counties of England, historic county and Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people ...
and
Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spell ...
. Billington states that the "life-and-death intensity of daily experience" before and during the Blitz left Pinter with profound memories "of loneliness, bewilderment, separation and loss: themes that are in all his works." Pinter discovered his social potential as a student at
Hackney Downs School Hackney Downs School was an 11–16 boys, community comprehensive secondary school in Lower Clapton, Greater London, England. It was established in 1876 and closed in 1995. It has been replaced by the Mossbourne Community Academy. History ...
, a London grammar school, between 1944 and 1948. "Partly through the school and partly through the social life of Hackney Boys' Club ... he formed an almost sacerdotal belief in the power of male friendship. The friends he made in those days—most particularly Henry Woolf, Michael (Mick) Goldstein and Morris (Moishe) Wernick—have always been a vital part of the emotional texture of his life." A major influence on Pinter was his inspirational English teacher Joseph Brearley, who directed him in school plays and with whom he took long walks, talking about literature. According to Billington, under Brearley's instruction, "Pinter shone at English, wrote for the school magazine and discovered a gift for acting." In 1947 and 1948, he played Romeo and
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
in productions directed by Brearley. At the age of 12, Pinter began writing poetry, and in spring 1947, his poetry was first published in the ''Hackney Downs School Magazine''. In 1950 his poetry was first published outside the school magazine, in ''
Poetry London ''Poetry London'' is a literary periodical based in London. Published three times a year, it features poems, reviews, and other articles. Profile Adopting the title of an earlier bimonthly publication which ran from 1939 to 1951, ''Poetry London' ...
'', some of it under the pseudonym "Harold Pinta". Pinter was an atheist.


Sport and friendship

Pinter enjoyed running and broke the Hackney Downs School sprinting record.Baker, "Growing Up," chap. 1 of ''Harold Pinter'' 2–23. He was a
cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...
enthusiast, taking his bat with him when evacuated during the Blitz. In 1971, he told
Mel Gussow Melvyn Hayes "Mel" Gussow (; December 19, 1933 – April 29, 2005) was an American theater critic, movie critic, and author who wrote for '' The New York Times'' for 35 years. Biography Gussow was born in New York City and grew up in Rockville ...
: "one of my main obsessions in life is the game of cricket—I play and watch and read about it all the time." He was chairman of the Gaieties Cricket Club, a supporter of Yorkshire Cricket Club, and devoted a section of his official website to the sport. One wall of his study was dominated by a portrait of himself as a young man playing cricket, which was described by Sarah Lyall, writing in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'': "The painted Mr. Pinter, poised to swing his bat, has a wicked glint in his eye; testosterone all but flies off the canvas." Pinter approved of the "urban and exacting idea of cricket as a bold theatre of aggression." After his death, several of his school contemporaries recalled his achievements in sports, especially cricket and running. The
BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC's ...
memorial tribute included an essay on Pinter and cricket. Other interests that Pinter mentioned to interviewers are family, love and sex, drinking, writing, and reading.See, e.g., Gussow, ''Conversations with Pinter'' 25–30; Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 7–16; and Merritt, ''Pinter in Play'' 194. According to Billington, "If the notion of male loyalty, competitive rivalry and fear of betrayal forms a constant thread in Pinter's work from ''The Dwarfs'' onwards, its origins can be found in his teenage Hackney years. Pinter adores women, enjoys flirting with them, and worships their resilience and strength. But, in his early work especially, they are often seen as disruptive influences on some pure and Platonic ideal of male friendship: one of the most crucial of all Pinter's lost Edens."


Early theatrical training and stage experience

Beginning in late 1948, Pinter attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art for two terms, but hating the school, missed most of his classes, feigned a nervous breakdown, and dropped out in 1949.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 20–25, 31–35; and Batty, ''About Pinter'' 7. In 1948 he was called up for
National Service National service is the system of voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. The ...
. He was initially refused registration as a conscientious objector, leading to his twice being prosecuted, and fined, for refusing to accept a medical examination, before his CO registration was ultimately agreed. He had a small part in the Christmas
pantomime Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and (to a lesser extent) in other English-speakin ...
'' Dick Whittington and His Cat'' at the Chesterfield Hippodrome in 1949 to 1950.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 37; and Batty, ''About Pinter'' 8. From January to July 1951, he attended the Central School of Speech and Drama.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 31, 36, and 38; and Batty, ''About Pinter'' xiii and 8. From 1951 to 1952, he toured Ireland with the
Anew McMaster Anew McMaster (24 December 1891 – 24 August 1962) was a British stage actor who during his nearly 45 year acting career toured the UK, Ireland, Australia and the United States. For almost 35 years he toured as actor-manager of his own theatr ...
repertory company, playing over a dozen roles.Pinter, "Mac", ''Various Voices'' 36–43. In 1952, he began acting in regional English repertory productions; from 1953 to 1954, he worked for the
Donald Wolfit Sir Donald Wolfit, KBE (born Donald Woolfitt; Harwood, Ronald"Wolfit, Sir Donald (1902–1968)" ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, September 2004; online edn, January 2008; accessed 14 July 2009 20 April 1902 ...
Company, at the King's Theatre,
Hammersmith Hammersmith is a district of West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It is the administrative centre of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, and identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London ...
, performing eight roles.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 20–25, 31, 36, and 37–41. From 1954 until 1959, Pinter acted under the stage name David Baron., In all, Pinter played over 20 roles under that name.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 49–55. To supplement his income from acting, Pinter worked as a waiter, a postman, a bouncer, and a snow-clearer, meanwhile, according to Mark Batty, "harbouring ambitions as a poet and writer." In October 1989 Pinter recalled: "I was in English rep as an actor for about 12 years. My favourite roles were undoubtedly the sinister ones. They're something to get your teeth into." During that period, he also performed occasional roles in his own and others' works for radio, TV, and film, as he continued to do throughout his career.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 20–25, 31, 36, 38.


Marriages and family life

From 1956 until 1980, Pinter was married to Vivien Merchant, an actress whom he met on tour, perhaps best known for her performance in the 1966 film '' Alfie''. Their son Daniel was born in 1958. Through the early 1970s, Merchant appeared in many of Pinter's works, including '' The Homecoming'' on stage (1965) and screen (1973), but the marriage was turbulent. For seven years, from 1962 to 1969, Pinter was engaged in a clandestine affair with BBC-TV presenter and journalist Joan Bakewell, which inspired his 1978 play '' Betrayal'',Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 257–67. and also throughout that period and beyond he had an affair with an American socialite, whom he nicknamed "Cleopatra". This relationship was another secret he kept from both his wife and Bakewell. Initially, ''Betrayal'' was thought to be a response to his later affair with historian
Antonia Fraser Lady Antonia Margaret Caroline Fraser, (' Pakenham; born 27 August 1932) is a British author of history, novels, biographies and detective fiction. She is the widow of the 2005 Nobel Laureate in Literature, Harold Pinter (1930–2008), and ...
, the wife of Hugh Fraser, and Pinter's "marital crack-up".Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 257. Pinter and Merchant had both met Antonia Fraser in 1969, when all three worked together on a
National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director ...
programme about
Mary, Queen of Scots Mary, Queen of Scots (8 December 1542 – 8 February 1587), also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, was Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced abdication in 1567. The only surviving legitimate child of James V of S ...
; several years later, on 8–9 January 1975, Pinter and Fraser became romantically involved.Fraser, Chap. 1: "First Night", ''Must You Go?'' 3–19. That meeting initiated their five-year extramarital love affair.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 252–53. After hiding the relationship from Merchant for two and a half months, on 21 March 1975, Pinter finally told her "I've met somebody". After that, "Life in Hanover Terrace gradually became impossible", and Pinter moved out of their house on 28 April 1975, five days after the première of '' No Man's Land''.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 253–55. In mid-August 1977, after Pinter and Fraser had spent two years living in borrowed and rented quarters, they moved into her former family home in Holland Park, where Pinter began writing ''Betrayal''. He reworked it later, while on holiday at the Grand Hotel in
Eastbourne Eastbourne () is a town and seaside resort in East Sussex, on the south coast of England, east of Brighton and south of London. Eastbourne is immediately east of Beachy Head, the highest chalk sea cliff in Great Britain and part of the l ...
, in early January 1978. After the Frasers' divorce had become final in 1977 and the Pinters' in 1980, Pinter married Fraser on 27 November 1980. Because of a two-week delay in Merchant's signing the divorce papers, however, the reception had to precede the actual ceremony, originally scheduled to occur on his 50th birthday. Vivien Merchant died of acute alcoholism in the first week of October 1982, at the age of 53. Billington writes that Pinter "did everything possible to support" her and regretted that he ultimately became estranged from their son, Daniel, after their separation, Pinter's remarriage, and Merchant's death. A reclusive gifted musician and writer, Daniel changed his surname from Pinter to Brand, the maiden name of his maternal grandmother, before Pinter and Fraser became romantically involved; while according to Fraser, his father could not understand it, she says that she could: "Pinter is such a distinctive name that he must have got tired of being asked, 'Any relation? Michael Billington wrote that Pinter saw Daniel's name change as "a largely pragmatic move on Daniel's part designed to keep the press ... at bay."Billington 254–55; cf. 345. Fraser told Billington that Daniel "was very nice to me at a time when it would have been only too easy for him to have turned on me ... simply because he had been the sole focus of his father's love and now manifestly wasn't." Still unreconciled at the time of his father's death, Daniel Brand did not attend Pinter's funeral. Billington observes that "The break-up with Vivien and the new life with Antonia was to have a profound effect on Pinter's personality and his work," though he adds that Fraser herself did not claim to have influence over Pinter or his writing.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 255. In her own contemporaneous diary entry dated 15 January 1993, Fraser described herself more as Pinter's literary midwife. Indeed, she told Billington that "other people uch_as_Peggy_Ashcroft,_among_others.html" ;"title="Peggy_Ashcroft.html" ;"title="uch as Peggy Ashcroft">uch as Peggy Ashcroft, among others">Peggy_Ashcroft.html" ;"title="uch as Peggy Ashcroft">uch as Peggy Ashcroft, among othershad a shaping influence on [Pinter's] politics" and attributed changes in his writing and political views to a change from "an unhappy, complicated personal life ... to a happy, uncomplicated personal life", so that "a side of Harold which had always been there was somehow released. I think you can see that in his work after '' No Man's Land'' 975 which was a very bleak play." Pinter was content in his second marriage and enjoyed family life with his six adult stepchildren and 17 step-grandchildren.See Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 388, 429–30. Even after battling cancer for several years, he considered himself "a very lucky man in every respect". Sarah Lyall notes in her 2007 interview with Pinter in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' that his "latest work, a slim pamphlet called 'Six Poems for A.', comprises poems written over 32 years, with "A" of course being Lady Antonia. The first of the poems was written in Paris, where she and Mr. Pinter traveled soon after they met. More than three decades later the two are rarely apart, and Mr. Pinter turns soft, even cozy, when he talks about his wife." In that interview Pinter "acknowledged that his plays—full of infidelity, cruelty, inhumanity, the lot—seem at odds with his domestic contentment. 'How can you write a happy play?' he said. 'Drama is about conflict and degrees of perturbation, disarray. I've never been able to write a happy play, but I've been able to enjoy a happy life. After his death, Fraser told ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...
'': "He was a great man, and it was a privilege to live with him for over 33 years. He will never be forgotten."


Civic activities and political activism

In 1948–49, when he was 18, Pinter opposed the politics of the
Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...
, leading to his decision to become a conscientious objector and to refuse to comply with
National Service National service is the system of voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. The ...
in the British military. However, he told interviewers that, if he had been old enough at the time, he would have fought against the
Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in N ...
in
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
. He seemed to express ambivalence, both indifference and hostility, towards political structures and politicians in his Fall 1966 ''
Paris Review ''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Ph ...
'' interview conducted by Lawrence M. Bensky. Yet, he had been an early member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and also had supported the British Anti-Apartheid Movement (1959–1994), participating in British artists' refusal to permit professional productions of their work in South Africa in 1963 and in subsequent related campaigns.Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 286–305 (chap. 15: "Public Affairs"), 400–03, and 433–41; and Merritt, ''Pinter in Play'' 171–209 (chap. 8: "Cultural Politics," espec. "Pinter and Politics"). In "A Play and Its Politics", a 1985 interview with Nicholas Hern, Pinter described his earlier plays retrospectively from the perspective of the politics of power and the dynamics of oppression.Merritt, "Pinter and Politics," ''Pinter in Play'' 171–89. In his last 25 years, Pinter increasingly focused his essays, interviews and public appearances directly on political issues. He was an officer in
International PEN PEN International (known as International PEN until 2010) is a worldwide association of writers, founded in London in 1921 to promote friendship and intellectual co-operation among writers everywhere. The association has autonomous Internatio ...
, travelling with American playwright Arthur Miller to
Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...
in 1985 on a mission co-sponsored with a Helsinki Watch committee to investigate and protest against the torture of imprisoned writers. There he met victims of political oppression and their families. Pinter's experiences in Turkey and his knowledge of the Turkish suppression of the
Kurdish language Kurdish (, ) is a language or a group of languages spoken by Kurds in the geo-cultural region of Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora. Kurdish constitutes a dialect continuum, belonging to Western Iranian languages in the Indo-European lan ...
inspired his 1988 play '' Mountain Language.''Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 309–10; and Gussow, ''Conversations with Pinter'' 67–68. He was also an active member of the Cuba Solidarity Campaign, an organisation that "campaigns in the UK against the US blockade of
Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribb ...
". In 2001 Pinter joined the International Committee to Defend Slobodan Milošević (ICDSM), which appealed for a fair trial and for the freedom of
Slobodan Milošević Slobodan Milošević (, ; 20 August 1941 – 11 March 2006) was a Yugoslav and Serbian politician who was the president of Serbia within Yugoslavia from 1989 to 1997 (originally the Socialist Republic of Serbia, a constituent republic of ...
, signing a related "Artists' Appeal for Milošević" in 2004. Pinter strongly opposed the 1991
Gulf War The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Iraq were carried out in two key phases: ...
, the 1999
NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two N ...
bombing campaign in
FR Yugoslavia Serbia and Montenegro ( sr, Cрбија и Црна Гора, translit=Srbija i Crna Gora) was a country in Southeast Europe located in the Balkans that existed from 1992 to 2006, following the breakup of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yu ...
during the
Kosovo War The Kosovo War was an armed conflict in Kosovo that started 28 February 1998 and lasted until 11 June 1999. It was fought by the forces of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (i.e. Serbia and Montenegro), which controlled Kosovo before the war ...
, the United States' 2001 War in Afghanistan, and the
2003 Invasion of Iraq The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including ...
. Among his provocative political statements, Pinter called Prime Minister
Tony Blair Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (born 6 May 1953) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007. He previously served as Leader of t ...
a "deluded idiot" and compared the administration of President George W. Bush to
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. He stated that the United States "was charging towards world domination while the American public and Britain's '
mass-murder Mass murder is the act of murdering a number of people, typically simultaneously or over a relatively short period of time and in close geographic proximity. The United States Congress defines mass killings as the killings of three or more pe ...
ing' prime minister sat back and watched." He was very active in the antiwar movement in the United Kingdom, speaking at rallies held by the Stop the War Coalition and frequently criticising American aggression, as when he asked rhetorically, in his acceptance speech for the Wilfred Owen Award for Poetry on 18 March 2007: "What would Wilfred Owen make of the
invasion of Iraq The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including 26 ...
? A bandit act, an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the conception of
international law International law (also known as public international law and the law of nations) is the set of rules, norms, and standards generally recognized as binding between states. It establishes normative guidelines and a common conceptual framework for ...
." Pinter earned a reputation for being pugnacious, enigmatic, taciturn, terse, prickly, explosive and forbidding. Pinter's blunt political statements, and the award of the Nobel Prize in Literature, elicited strong criticism and even, at times, provoked ridicule and personal attacks.See, e.g., ; ; and The historian Geoffrey Alderman, author of the official history of Hackney Downs School, expressed his own "Jewish View" of Harold Pinter: "Whatever his merit as a writer, actor and director, on an ethical plane Harold Pinter seems to me to have been intensely flawed, and his moral compass deeply fractured." David Edgar, writing in ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...
'', defended Pinter against what he termed Pinter's "being berated by the belligerati" like
Johann Hari Johann Eduard Hari (born 21 January 1979) is a British-Swiss writer and journalist who has written for ''The Independent'' and ''The Huffington Post''. In 2011, Hari was suspended from ''The Independent'' and later resigned, after admitting to ...
, who felt that he did not "deserve" to win the Nobel Prize.See also the comments of
Václav Havel Václav Havel (; 5 October 193618 December 2011) was a Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright, and former dissident. Havel served as the last president of Czechoslovakia from 1989 until the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1992 and then ...
and others, excerpted in "A Colossal Figure", which accompanies a reprinting of Pinter's essay , adapted from Pinter's "Acceptance Speech" for the 2005 Wilfred Owen Award for Poetry published in Pinter, ''Various Voices'' 267–68.
Later Pinter continued to campaign against the Iraq War and on behalf of other political causes that he supported. Pinter signed the mission statement of
Jews for Justice for Palestinians Jews for Justice for Palestinians (JJP) is a group based in Britain that describes itself as advocating for human and civil rights, and economic and political freedom, for the Palestinian people. It opposes the current policy of Israel towards ...
in 2005 and its full-page advertisement, "What Is Israel Doing? A Call by Jews in Britain", published in ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ( ...
'' on 6 July 2006, and he was a patron of the
Palestine Festival of Literature The Palestine Festival of Literature (PalFest) is an annual literary festival, founded in 2008, that takes place in cities across Palestine. History The festival was founded in 2008 with the stated mission of affirming "the power of culture ...
. In April 2008 Pinter signed the statement "We're not celebrating Israel's anniversary". The statement noted: "We cannot celebrate the birthday of a state founded on terrorism, massacres and the dispossession of another people from their land.", "We will celebrate when Arab and Jew live as equals in a peaceful Middle East"


Career


As actor

Pinter's acting career spanned over 50 years and, although he often played villains, included a wide range of roles on stage and in radio, film, and television. In addition to roles in radio and television adaptations of his own plays and dramatic sketches, early in his screenwriting career he made several cameo appearances in films based on his own screenplays; for example, as a society man in '' The Servant'' (1963) and as Mr. Bell in '' Accident'' (1967), both directed by Joseph Losey; and as a bookshop customer in his later film ''
Turtle Diary ''Turtle Diary'' is a 1985 British film directed by John Irvin and starring Glenda Jackson, Ben Kingsley, and Michael Gambon. Based on a screenplay adapted by Harold Pinter from Russell Hoban's novel ''Turtle Diary'', the film is about "people ...
'' (1985), starring Michael Gambon, Glenda Jackson, and Ben Kingsley. Pinter's notable film and television roles included the lawyer Saul Abrahams opposite
Peter O'Toole Peter Seamus O'Toole (; 2 August 1932 – 14 December 2013) was a British stage and film actor. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and began working in the theatre, gaining recognition as a Shakespearean actor at the Bristol Old V ...
in '' Rogue Male'',
BBC TV BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1927. It produced television programmes from its own studios from 193 ...
's 1976 adaptation of
Geoffrey Household Geoffrey Edward West Household (30 November 1900 – 4 October 1988) was a prolific British novelist who specialized in thrillers. He is best known for his novel '' Rogue Male'' (1939). Personal life He was born in Bristol; his father Horace ...
's 1939 novel, and a drunk Irish journalist in '' Langrishe, Go Down'' (starring
Judi Dench Dame Judith Olivia Dench (born 9 December 1934) is an English actress. Regarded as one of Britain's best actresses, she is noted for her versatile work in various films and television programmes encompassing several genres, as well as for her ...
and Jeremy Irons) distributed on
BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream a ...
in 1978 and released in movie theatres in 2002. Pinter's later film roles included the criminal Sam Ross in ''Mojo'' (1997), written and directed by Jez Butterworth, based on Butterworth's play of the same name; Sir Thomas Bertram (his most substantial feature-film role) in '' Mansfield Park'' (1998), a character that Pinter described as "a very civilised man ... a man of great sensibility but in fact, he's upholding and sustaining a totally brutal system he slave tradefrom which he derives his money"; and Uncle Benny, opposite Pierce Brosnan and
Geoffrey Rush Geoffrey Roy Rush (born 6 July 1951) is an Australian actor. He is known for his eccentric leading man roles on stage and screen. He is among 24 people who have won the Triple Crown of Acting, having received an Academy Award, a Primetime Emm ...
, in ''
The Tailor of Panama ''The Tailor of Panama'' is a 1996 novel by British writer John le Carré. A 2001 film was released based on the novel. Plot Harry Pendel is a British expatriate living in Panama City and running his own successful bespoke tailoring busine ...
'' (2001). In television films, he played Mr. Bearing, the father of
ovarian cancer Ovarian cancer is a cancerous tumor of an ovary. It may originate from the ovary itself or more commonly from communicating nearby structures such as fallopian tubes or the inner lining of the abdomen. The ovary is made up of three different ...
patient Vivian Bearing, played by
Emma Thompson Dame Emma Thompson (born 15 April 1959) is a British actress. Regarded as one of the best actresses of her generation, she has received numerous accolades throughout her four-decade-long career, including two Academy Awards, two British A ...
in
Mike Nichols Mike Nichols (born Michael Igor Peschkowsky; November 6, 1931 – November 19, 2014) was an American film and theater director, producer, actor, and comedian. He was noted for his ability to work across a range of genres and for his aptitude fo ...
's HBO film of the
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made ...
-winning play ''
Wit Wit is a form of intelligent humour, the ability to say or write things that are clever and usually funny. Someone witty is a person who is skilled at making clever and funny remarks. Forms of wit include the quip, repartee, and wisecrack. For ...
'' (2001); and the Director opposite John Gielgud (Gielgud's last role) and Rebecca Pidgeon in ''
Catastrophe Catastrophe or catastrophic comes from the Greek κατά (''kata'') = down; στροφή (''strophē'') = turning ( el, καταστροφή). It may refer to: A general or specific event * Disaster, a devastating event * The Asia Minor Catastro ...
'', by Samuel Beckett, directed by David Mamet as part of ''Beckett on Film'' (2001).


As director

Pinter began to direct more frequently during the 1970s, becoming an associate director of the National Theatre (NT) in 1973. He directed almost 50 productions of his own and others' plays for stage, film, and television, including 10 productions of works by Simon Gray: the stage and/or film premières of '' Butley'' (stage, 1971; film, 1974), '' Otherwise Engaged'' (1975), ''The Rear Column'' (stage, 1978; TV, 1980), ''Close of Play'' (NT, 1979), '' Quartermaine's Terms'' (1981), ''Life Support'' (1997), ''The Late Middle Classes'' (1999), and ''The Old Masters'' (2004). Several of those productions starred
Alan Bates Sir Alan Arthur Bates (17 February 1934 – 27 December 2003) was an English actor who came to prominence in the 1960s, when he appeared in films ranging from the popular children's story '' Whistle Down the Wind'' to the " kitchen sink" dram ...
(1934–2003), who originated the stage and screen roles of not only Butley but also Mick in Pinter's first major commercial success, ''
The Caretaker ''The Caretaker'' is a play in three acts by Harold Pinter. Although it was the sixth of his major works for stage and television, this psychological study of the confluence of power, allegiance, innocence, and corruption among two brothers a ...
'' (stage, 1960; film, 1964); and in Pinter's double-bill produced at the Lyric Hammersmith in 1984, he played Nicolas in '' One for the Road'' and the cab driver in '' Victoria Station''. Among over 35 plays that Pinter directed were ''Next of Kin'' (1974), by John Hopkins; ''
Blithe Spirit Blithe Spirit may refer to: * ''Blithe Spirit'' (play), a 1941 comic play written by Noël Coward * ''Blithe Spirit'' (1945 film), a British comedy film based on the play * ''Blithe Spirit'' (2020 film), a British-American comedy film based on th ...
'' (1976), by Noël Coward; '' The Innocents'' (1976), by William Archibald; ''Circe and Bravo'' (1986), by Donald Freed; '' Taking Sides'' (1995), by
Ronald Harwood Sir Ronald Harwood (né Horwitz; 9 November 1934 – 8 September 2020) was a South African-born British author, playwright, and screenwriter, best known for his plays for the British stage as well as the screenplays for ''The Dresser'' (for wh ...
; and '' Twelve Angry Men'' (1996), by
Reginald Rose Reginald Rose (December 10, 1920 – April 19, 2002) was an American screenwriter. He wrote about controversial social and political issues. His realistic approach was particularly influential in the anthology programs of the 1950s. Rose w ...
.


As playwright

Pinter was the author of 29 plays and 15 dramatic sketches and the co-author of two works for stage and radio. He was considered to have been one of the most influential modern British dramatists, Along with the 1967 Tony Award for Best Play for ''The Homecoming'' and several other American awards and award nominations, he and his plays received many awards in the UK and elsewhere throughout the world. His style has entered the English language as an adjective, " Pinteresque", although Pinter himself disliked the term and found it meaningless.


"Comedies of menace" (1957–1968)

Pinter's first play, '' The Room'', written and first performed in 1957, was a student production at the
University of Bristol , mottoeng = earningpromotes one's innate power (from Horace, ''Ode 4.4'') , established = 1595 – Merchant Venturers School1876 – University College, Bristol1909 – received royal charter , type ...
, directed by his good friend, actor Henry Woolf, who also originated the role of Mr. Kidd (which he reprised in 2001 and 2007). After Pinter mentioned that he had an idea for a play, Woolf asked him to write it so that he could direct it to fulfill a requirement for his postgraduate work. Pinter wrote it in three days.Merritt, "Talking about Pinter" 147. The production was described by Billington as "a staggeringly confident debut which attracted the attention of a young producer, Michael Codron, who decided to present Pinter's next play, '' The Birthday Party'', at the Lyric Hammersmith, in 1958." Written in 1957 and produced in 1958, Pinter's second play, ''The Birthday Party'', one of his best-known works, was initially both a commercial and critical disaster, despite an enthusiastic review in ''
The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
'' by its influential drama critic Harold Hobson, which appeared only after the production had closed and could not be reprieved. Critical accounts often quote Hobson:
I am well aware that Mr Pinter play received extremely bad notices last Tuesday morning. At the moment I write these ordsit is uncertain even whether the play will still be in the bill by the time they appear, though it is probable it will soon be seen elsewhere. Deliberately, I am willing to risk whatever reputation I have as a judge of plays by saying that ''The Birthday Party'' is not a Fourth, not even a Second, but a First s in Class Honours and that Pinter, on the evidence of his work, possesses the most original, disturbing and arresting talent in theatrical London ... Mr Pinter and ''The Birthday Party'', despite their experiences last week, will be heard of again. Make a note of their names.
Pinter himself and later critics generally credited Hobson as bolstering him and perhaps even rescuing his career. In a review published in 1958, borrowing from the subtitle of ''The Lunatic View: A Comedy of Menace'', a play by David Campton, critic Irving Wardle called Pinter's early plays " comedy of menace"—a label that people have applied repeatedly to his work.Merritt, ''Pinter in Play'' 5, 9, 225–26, and 310. Such plays begin with an apparently innocent situation that becomes both threatening and " absurd" as Pinter's characters behave in ways often perceived as inexplicable by his audiences and one another. Pinter acknowledges the influence of Samuel Beckett, particularly on his early work; they became friends, sending each other drafts of their works in progress for comments.See Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 64, 65, 84, 197, 251 and 354 Pinter wrote '' The Hothouse'' in 1958, which he shelved for over 20 years (See "Overtly political plays and sketches" below). Next he wrote '' The Dumb Waiter'' (1959), which premièred in Germany and was then produced in a double bill with ''The Room'' at the
Hampstead Theatre Club Hampstead Theatre is a theatre in South Hampstead in the London Borough of Camden. It specialises in commissioning and producing new writing, supporting and developing the work of new writers. Roxana Silbert has been the artistic director sin ...
, in London, in 1960. It was then not produced often until the 1980s, and it has been revived more frequently since 2000, including the West End Trafalgar Studios production in 2007. The first production of ''
The Caretaker ''The Caretaker'' is a play in three acts by Harold Pinter. Although it was the sixth of his major works for stage and television, this psychological study of the confluence of power, allegiance, innocence, and corruption among two brothers a ...
'', at the Arts Theatre Club, in London, in 1960, established Pinter's theatrical reputation. The play transferred to the Duchess Theatre in May 1960 and ran for 444 performances, receiving an Evening Standard Award for best play of 1960. Large radio and television audiences for his one-act play '' A Night Out'', along with the popularity of his revue sketches, propelled him to further critical attention. In 1964, ''The Birthday Party'' was revived both on television (with Pinter himself in the role of Goldberg) and on stage (directed by Pinter at the Aldwych Theatre) and was well received. By the time Peter Hall's London production of ''The Homecoming'' (1964) reached Broadway in 1967, Pinter had become a celebrity playwright, and the play garnered four
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as the Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual c ...
s, among other awards. During this period, Pinter also wrote the radio play '' A Slight Ache'', first broadcast on the BBC Third Programme in 1959 and then adapted to the stage and performed at the Arts Theatre Club in 1961. ''A Night Out'' (1960) was broadcast to a large audience on ABC Weekend TV's television show '' Armchair Theatre'', after being transmitted on BBC Radio 3, also in 1960. His play ''
Night School A night school is an adult learning school that holds classes in the evening or at night to accommodate people who work during the day. A community college or university may hold night school classes that admit undergraduates. Italy The Scuola ...
'' was first televised in 1960 on Associated Rediffusion. '' The Collection'' premièred at the Aldwych Theatre in 1962, and ''The Dwarfs'', adapted from Pinter's then unpublished novel of the same title, was first broadcast on radio in 1960, then adapted for the stage (also at the Arts Theatre Club) in a double bill with '' The Lover'', which had previously been televised by Associated Rediffusion in 1963; and '' Tea Party'', a play that Pinter developed from his 1963 short story, first broadcast on
BBC TV BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1927. It produced television programmes from its own studios from 193 ...
in 1965. Working as both a screenwriter and as a playwright, Pinter composed a script called '' The Compartment'' (1966), for a trilogy of films to be contributed by Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, and Pinter, of which only Beckett's film, titled ''Film (film), Film'', was actually produced. Then Pinter turned his unfilmed script into a television play, which was produced as ''The Basement (play), The Basement'', both on BBC 2 and also on stage in 1968.Baker and Ross, "Chronology" xxiii–xl.


"Memory plays" (1968–1982)

From the late 1960s through the early 1980s, Pinter wrote a series of plays and sketches that explore complex ambiguities, elegiac mysteries, comic vagaries, and other "quicksand-like" characteristics of memory and which critics sometimes classify as Pinter's "memory plays".Billington, Introduction, "Pinter: Passion, Poetry, Politics", ''Europe Theatre Prize–X Edition'', Turin, 10–12 March 2006. Retrieved 29 January 2011. Cf. Billington, chap. 29: "Memory Man" and "Afterword: Let's Keep Fighting", ''Harold Pinter'' 388–430. These include ''Landscape (play), Landscape'' (1968), ''Silence (play), Silence'' (1969), ''Night (sketch), Night'' (1969), ''Old Times'' (1971), '' No Man's Land'' (1975), ''The Proust Screenplay'' (1977), '' Betrayal'' (1978), ''Family Voices'' (1981), '' Victoria Station'' (1982), and ''A Kind of Alaska'' (1982). Some of Pinter's later plays, including ''Party Time'' (1991), ''Moonlight (play), Moonlight'' (1993), ''Ashes to Ashes (play), Ashes to Ashes'' (1996), and ''Celebration (play), Celebration'' (2000), draw upon some features of his "memory" dramaturgy in their focus on the past in the present, but they have personal and political resonances and other tonal differences from these earlier memory plays.See Batty, ''About Pinter''; Grimes; and Baker (all ''passim'').


Overtly political plays and sketches (1980–2000)

Following a three-year period of creative drought in the early 1980s after his marriage to Antonia Fraser and the death of Vivien Merchant, Pinter's plays tended to become shorter and more overtly political, serving as critiques of oppression, torture, and other abuses of human rights,Merritt, ''Pinter in Play'' xi–xv and 170–209; Grimes 19. linked by the apparent "invulnerability of power." Just before this hiatus, in 1979, Pinter re-discovered his manuscript of '' The Hothouse'', which he had written in 1958 but had set aside; he revised it and then directed its first production himself at Hampstead Theatre in London, in 1980. Like his plays of the 1980s, ''The Hothouse'' concerns authoritarianism and the abuses of power politics, but it is also a comedy, like his earlier Comedy of menace, comedies of menace. Pinter played the major role of Roote in a 1995 revival at the Minerva Theatre, Chichester.Merritt, "Pinter Playing Pinter" (''passim''); and Grimes 16, 36–38, 61–71. Pinter's brief dramatic sketch ''Precisely'' (1983) is a duologue between two bureaucrats exploring the absurd power politics of mutual nuclear annihilation and Deterrence theory, deterrence. His first overtly political one-act play is '' One for the Road'' (1984). In 1985 Pinter stated that whereas his earlier plays presented metaphors for power and powerlessness, the later ones present literal realities of power and its abuse. Pinter's "political theatre dramatizes the interplay and conflict of the opposing poles of involvement and disengagement." '' Mountain Language'' (1988) is about the Turkish suppression of the
Kurdish language Kurdish (, ) is a language or a group of languages spoken by Kurds in the geo-cultural region of Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora. Kurdish constitutes a dialect continuum, belonging to Western Iranian languages in the Indo-European lan ...
. The dramatic sketch ''The New World Order'' (1991) provides what Robert Cushman, writing in ''The Independent'' described as "10 nerve-wracking minutes" of two men threatening to torture a third man who is blindfolded, gagged and bound in a chair; Pinter directed the British première at the Royal Court Theatre, Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, where it opened on 9 July 1991, and the production then transferred to Washington, D.C., where it was revived in 1994. Pinter's longer political satire ''Party Time'' (1991) premièred at the Almeida Theatre in London, in a double-bill with ''Mountain Language''. Pinter adapted it as a screenplay for television in 1992, directing that production, first broadcast in the UK on Channel 4 on 17 November 1992.Grimes 101–28 and 139–43; Intertwining political and personal concerns, his next full-length plays, ''Moonlight (play), Moonlight'' (1993) and ''Ashes to Ashes (play), Ashes to Ashes'' (1996) are set in domestic households and focus on dying and death; in their personal conversations in ''Ashes to Ashes'', Devlin and Rebecca allude to unspecified atrocities relating to the The Holocaust, Holocaust.Merritt, "Harold Pinter's ''Ashes to Ashes'': Political/Personal Echoes of the Holocaust" (''passim''); Grimes 195–220. After experiencing the deaths of first his mother (1992) and then his father (1997), again merging the personal and the political, Pinter wrote the poems "Death" (1997) and "The Disappeared" (1998). Pinter's last stage play, ''Celebration (play), Celebration'' (2000), is a social satire set in an opulent restaurant, which lampoons The Ivy, a fashionable venue in London's West End theatre district, and its patrons who "have just come from performances of either the ballet or the opera. Not that they can remember a darn thing about what they saw, including the titles. [These] gilded, foul-mouthed souls are just as myopic when it comes to their own table mates (and for that matter, their food), with conversations that usually connect only on the surface, if there." On its surface the play may appear to have fewer overtly political resonances than some of the plays from the 1980s and 1990s; but its central male characters, brothers named Lambert and Matt, are members of the elite (like the men in charge in ''Party Time''), who describe themselves as "peaceful strategy consultants [because] we don't carry guns." At the next table, Russell, a banker, describes himself as a "totally disordered personality ... a psychopath", while Lambert "vows to be reincarnated as '[a] more civilised, [a] gentler person, [a] nicer person'." These characters' deceptively smooth exteriors mask their extreme viciousness. ''Celebration'' evokes familiar Pinteresque political contexts: "The ritzy loudmouths in 'Celebration' ... and the quieter working-class mumblers of 'The Room' ... have everything in common beneath the surface". "Money remains in the service of entrenched power, and the brothers in the play are 'strategy consultants' whose jobs involve force and violence ... It is tempting but inaccurate to equate the comic power inversions of the social behaviour in ''Celebration'' with lasting change in larger political structures", according to Grimes, for whom the play indicates Pinter's pessimism about the possibility of changing the status quo. Yet, as the Waiter's often comically unbelievable reminiscences about his grandfather demonstrate in ''Celebration'', Pinter's final stage plays also extend some expressionism, expressionistic aspects of his earlier "memory plays", while harking back to his "comedies of menace", as illustrated in the characters and in the Waiter's final speech: During 2000–2001, there were also simultaneous productions of ''Remembrance of Things Past (play), Remembrance of Things Past'', Pinter's stage adaptation of his unpublished ''Proust Screenplay'', written in collaboration with and directed by Di Trevis, at the Royal National Theatre, and a revival of ''
The Caretaker ''The Caretaker'' is a play in three acts by Harold Pinter. Although it was the sixth of his major works for stage and television, this psychological study of the confluence of power, allegiance, innocence, and corruption among two brothers a ...
'' directed by Patrick Marber and starring Michael Gambon, Rupert Graves, and Douglas Hodge, at the Comedy Theatre. Like ''Celebration'', Pinter's penultimate sketch, ''Press Conference'' (2002), "invokes both torture and the fragile, circumscribed existence of dissent". In its première in the National Theatre's two-part production of ''Sketches'', despite undergoing chemotherapy at the time, Pinter played the ruthless Minister willing to murder little children for the benefit of "The State".


As screenwriter

Pinter composed 27 screenplays and film scripts for cinema and television, many of which were filmed, or adapted as stage plays. His fame as a screenwriter began with his three screenplays written for films directed by Joseph Losey, leading to their close friendship: '' The Servant'' (1963), based on the novel by Robin Maugham; '' Accident'' (1967), adapted from the novel by Nicholas Mosley, 3rd Baron Ravensdale, Nicholas Mosley; and ''
The Go-Between ''The Go-Between'' is a novel by L. P. Hartley published in 1953. His best-known work, it has been adapted several times for stage and screen. The book gives a critical view of society at the end of the Victorian era through the eyes of a naï ...
'' (1971), based on the novel by L. P. Hartley. Films based on Pinter's adaptations of his own stage plays are: ''The Caretaker#Film adaptation, The Caretaker'' (1963), directed by Clive Donner; ''The Birthday Party (1968 film), The Birthday Party'' (1968), directed by William Friedkin; ''The Homecoming (film), The Homecoming'' (1973), directed by Peter Hall; and ''Betrayal (1983 film), Betrayal'' (1983), directed by David Jones (director), David Jones. Pinter also adapted other writers' novels to screenplays, including ''The Pumpkin Eater'' (1964), based on the novel by Penelope Mortimer, directed by Jack Clayton; ''The Quiller Memorandum'' (1966), from the 1965 spy novel ''The Berlin Memorandum'', by Elleston Trevor, directed by Michael Anderson (director), Michael Anderson; ''The Last Tycoon (1976 film), The Last Tycoon'' (1976), from the unfinished novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, directed by Elia Kazan; '' The French Lieutenant's Woman'' (1981), from the novel by John Fowles, directed by Karel Reisz; ''
Turtle Diary ''Turtle Diary'' is a 1985 British film directed by John Irvin and starring Glenda Jackson, Ben Kingsley, and Michael Gambon. Based on a screenplay adapted by Harold Pinter from Russell Hoban's novel ''Turtle Diary'', the film is about "people ...
'' (1985), based on the novel by Russell Hoban; ''The Heat of the Day'' (1988), a television film, from the 1949 novel by Elizabeth Bowen; ''The Comfort of Strangers (film), The Comfort of Strangers'' (1990), from the novel by Ian McEwan, directed by Paul Schrader; and '' The Trial'' (1993), from the novel by Franz Kafka, directed by David Jones. His commissioned screenplays of others' works for the films ''The Handmaid's Tale (film), The Handmaid's Tale'' (1990), ''The Remains of the Day (film), The Remains of the Day'' (1990), and ''Lolita (1997 film), Lolita'' (1997), remain unpublished and in the case of the latter two films, uncredited, though several scenes from or aspects of his scripts were used in these finished films. His screenplays ''Remembrance of Things Past (play), The Proust Screenplay'' (1972), ''Victory'' (1982), and ''The Dreaming Child (screenplay by Harold Pinter), The Dreaming Child'' (1997) and his unpublished screenplay ''The Tragedy of King Lear (screenplay by Harold Pinter), The Tragedy of King Lear'' (2000) have not been filmed. A section of Pinter's ''Proust Screenplay'' was, however, released as the 1984 film ''In Search of Lost Time#Adaptations, Swann in Love'' (''Un amour de Swann''), directed by Volker Schlöndorff, and it was also adapted by Michael Bakewell as a two-hour radio drama broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in 1995, before Pinter and director Di Trevis collaborated to adapt it for the 2000 National Theatre production. Pinter's last filmed screenplay was an adaptation of the 1970
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as the Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual c ...
-winning play ''Sleuth (play), Sleuth'', by Anthony Shaffer (writer), Anthony Shaffer, which was commissioned by Jude Law, one of the film's producers. It is the basis for the 2007 film ''
Sleuth Sleuth may refer to: *Detective *Sleuth, collective noun for a group of bears Computing * The Sleuth Kit, a collection of forensic analysis software *SLEUTH assembler language for the UNIVAC 1107 Entertainment and media *Cloo Cloo (stylized ...
'', directed by Kenneth Branagh. Pinter's screenplays for '' The French Lieutenant's Woman'' and ''Betrayal'' were nominated for Academy Awards in 1981 and 1983, respectively.


2001–2008

From 16 to 31 July 2001, a Harold Pinter Festival celebrating his work, curated by Michael Colgan (theatre director), Michael Colgan, artistic director of the Gate Theatre, Dublin, was held as part of the annual Lincoln Center Festival at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center in New York City. Pinter participated both as an actor, as Nicolas in ''One for the Road'', and as a director of a double bill pairing his last play, ''Celebration'', with his first play, ''The Room''.Merritt, "Talking about Pinter" (''passim''). As part of a two-week "Harold Pinter Homage" at the World Leaders Festival of Creative Genius, held from 24 September to 30 October 2001, at the Harbourfront Centre, in Toronto, Canada, Pinter presented a dramatic reading of ''Celebration'' (2000) and also participated in a public interview as part of the Culture in Toronto#Literature, International Festival of Authors. In December 2001, Pinter was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer, for which, in 2002, he underwent an operation and chemotherapy.; Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 413–16. During the course of his treatment, he directed a production of his play ''No Man's Land'', and wrote and performed in a new sketch, "Press Conference", for a production of his dramatic sketches at the National Theatre, and from 2002 on he was increasingly active in political causes, writing and presenting politically charged poetry, essays, speeches, as well as involved in developing his final two screenplay adaptations, ''The Tragedy of King Lear'' and ''Sleuth'', whose drafts are in the British Library's Harold Pinter Archive (Add MS 88880/2). From 9 to 25 January 2003, the Manitoba Theatre Centre, in Manitoba, Canada, held a nearly month-long ''PinterFest'', in which over 130 performances of twelve of Pinter's plays were performed by a dozen different theatre companies. Productions during the Festival included: ''The Hothouse'', ''Night School'', ''The Lover'', ''The Dumb Waiter'', ''The Homecoming'', ''The Birthday Party'', ''Monologue'', ''One for the Road'', ''The Caretaker'', ''Ashes to Ashes'', ''Celebration'', and ''No Man's Land''.Merritt, "PinterFest", in "Forthcoming Publications, Upcoming Productions, and Other Works in Progress", "Harold Pinter Bibliography: 2000–2002" (299). In 2005, Pinter stated that he had stopped writing plays and that he would be devoting his efforts more to his political activism and writing poetry: "I think I've written 29 plays. I think it's enough for me ... My energies are going in different directions—over the last few years I've made a number of political speeches at various locations and ceremonies ... I'm using a lot of energy more specifically about political states of affairs, which I think are very, very worrying as things stand." Some of this later poetry included "The 'Special Relationship'", "Laughter", and "The Watcher". From 2005, Pinter suffered ill health, including a rare skin disease called pemphigus and "a form of Sepsis, septicaemia that afflict[ed] his feet and made it difficult for him to walk." Yet, he completed his screenplay for the film of ''Sleuth'' in 2005. His last dramatic work for radio, ''Voices'' (2005), a collaboration with composer James Clarke (composer), James Clarke, adapting selected works by Pinter to music, premièred on BBC Radio 3 on his 75th birthday on 10 October 2005. Three days later, it was announced that he had won the 2005 Nobel Prize in Literature. In an interview with Pinter in 2006, conducted by critic Michael Billington as part of the cultural programme of the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Pinter confirmed that he would continue to write poetry but not plays. In response, the audience shouted ''No'' in unison, urging him to keep writing. Along with the international symposium on Pinter: Passion, Poetry, Politics, curated by Billington, the 2006 Europe Theatre Prize theatrical events celebrating Pinter included new productions (in French) of ''Precisely'' (1983), ''One for the Road'' (1984), ''Mountain Language'' (1988), ''The New World Order'' (1991), ''Party Time'' (1991), and ''Press Conference'' (2002) (French versions by Jean Pavans); and ''Pinter Plays, Poetry & Prose'', an evening of dramatic readings, directed by Alan Stanford, of the Gate Theatre, Dublin. In June 2006, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) hosted a celebration of Pinter's films curated by his friend, the playwright David Hare (playwright), David Hare. Hare introduced the selection of film clips by saying: "To jump back into the world of Pinter's movies ... is to remind yourself of a literate mainstream cinema, focused as much as Ingmar Bergman, Bergman's is on the human face, in which tension is maintained by a carefully crafted mix of image and dialogue."Billington, ''Harold Pinter'' 429. After returning to London from the Edinburgh International Book Festival, in September 2006, Pinter began rehearsing for his performance of the role of Krapp's Last Tape#Characters, Krapp in Samuel Beckett's one-act monologue ''Krapp's Last Tape'', which he performed from a motorised wheelchair in a limited run the following month at the Royal Court Theatre to sold-out audiences and "ecstatic" critical reviews. The production ran for only nine performances, as part of the 50th-anniversary celebration season of the Royal Court Theatre; it sold out within minutes of the opening of the box office and tickets commanded large sums from ticket resale, ticket resellers. One performance was filmed and broadcast on BBC Four on 21 June 2007, and also screened later, as part of the memorial PEN Tribute to Pinter, in New York, on 2 May 2009. In October and November 2006, Sheffield Theatres hosted Sheffield Theatres#Pinter: A Celebration, Pinter: A Celebration. It featured productions of seven of Pinter's plays: ''The Caretaker'', ''Voices'', ''No Man's Land'', ''Family Voices'', ''Tea Party'', ''The Room'', ''One for the Road'', and ''The Dumb Waiter''; and films (most his screenplays; some in which Pinter appears as an actor). In February and March 2007, a 50th anniversary of ''The Dumb Waiter'', was produced at the Trafalgar Studios. Later in February 2007, John Crowley (director), John Crowley's film version of Pinter's play ''Celebration'' (2000) was shown on ''More4'' (Channel 4, UK). On 18 March 2007, BBC Radio 3 broadcast a new radio production of ''The Homecoming'', directed by Thea Sharrock and produced by Martin J. Smith, with Pinter performing the role of Max (for the first time; he had previously played Lenny on stage in 1964). A revival of ''The Hothouse'' opened at the National Theatre, in London, in July 2007, concurrently with a revival of ''Betrayal'' at the Donmar Warehouse, directed by Roger Michell. Revivals in 2008 included the 40th-anniversary production of the American première of ''The Homecoming'' on Broadway, directed by Daniel J. Sullivan. From 8 to 24 May 2008, the Lyric Hammersmith celebrated the 50th anniversary of ''The Birthday Party'' with a revival and related events, including a gala performance and reception hosted by Harold Pinter on 19 May 2008, exactly 50 years after its London première there. The final revival during Pinter's lifetime was a production of ''No Man's Land'', directed by Rupert Goold, opening at the Gate Theatre, Dublin, in August 2008, and then transferring to the Duke of York's Theatre, London, where it played until 3 January 2009. On the Monday before Christmas 2008, Pinter was admitted to Hammersmith Hospital, where he died on Christmas Eve from liver cancer, aged 78. On 26 December 2008, when ''No Man's Land'' reopened at the Duke of York's, the actors paid tribute to Pinter from the stage, with Michael Gambon reading Hirst's monologue about his "photograph album" from Act Two that Pinter had asked him to read at his funeral, ending with a standing ovation from the audience, many of whom were in tears:


Posthumous events


Funeral

Pinter's funeral was a private, half-hour secular ceremony conducted at the graveside at Kensal Green Cemetery, 31 December 2008. The eight readings selected in advance by Pinter included passages from seven of his own writings and from the story "The Dead (short story), The Dead", by James Joyce, which was read by actress Penelope Wilton. Michael Gambon read the "photo album" speech from ''No Man's Land'' and three other readings, including Pinter's poem "Death" (1997). Other readings honoured Pinter's widow and his love of cricket. The ceremony was attended by many notable theatre people, including Tom Stoppard, but not by Pinter's son, Daniel Brand. At its end, Pinter's widow, Antonia Fraser, stepped forward to his grave and quoted from Horatio (character), Horatio's speech after the death of Prince Hamlet, Hamlet: "Goodnight, sweet prince, / And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."


Memorial tributes

The night before Pinter's burial, theatre marquees on Broadway dimmed their lights for a minute in tribute, and on the final night of ''No Man's Land'' at the Duke of York's Theatre on 3 January 2009, all of the Ambassador Theatre Group in the West End dimmed their lights for an hour to honour the playwright. Diane Abbott, the Member of Parliament (UK), Member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (UK Parliament constituency), Hackney North & Stoke Newington proposed an early day motion in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons to support a residents' campaign to restore the Clapton Cinematograph Theatre, established in Lower Clapton, Lower Clapton Road in 1910, and to turn it into a memorial to Pinter "to honour this Hackney boy turned literary great." On 2 May 2009, a free public memorial tribute was held at CUNY Graduate Center, The Graduate Center of The City University of New York. It was part of the 5th Annual PEN World Voices, PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature, taking place in New York City. Another memorial celebration, held in the Olivier Theatre, at the Royal National Theatre, in London, on the evening of 7 June 2009, consisted of excerpts and readings from Pinter's writings by nearly three dozen actors, many of whom were his friends and associates, including: Eileen Atkins, David Bradley (English actor), David Bradley, Colin Firth, Henry Goodman, Sheila Hancock, Alan Rickman, Penelope Wilton, Susan Wooldridge, and Henry Woolf; and a troupe of students from the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, directed by Ian Rickson. On 16 June 2009, Antonia Fraser officially opened a commemorative room at the Hackney Empire. The theatre also established a writer's residency in Pinter's name. Most of issue number 28 of Craig Raine's Arts Tri-Quarterly ''Areté'' was devoted to pieces remembering Pinter, beginning with Pinter's 1987 unpublished love poem dedicated "To Antonia" and his poem "Paris", written in 1975 (the year in which he and Fraser began living together), followed by brief memoirs by some of Pinter's associates and friends, including Patrick Marber, Nina Raine, Tom Stoppard, Peter Nichols (playwright), Peter Nichols, Susanna Gross, Richard Eyre, and David Hare. A memorial cricket match at Lord's Cricket Ground between the Gaieties Cricket Club and the Lord's Taverners, followed by performances of Pinter's poems and excerpts from his plays, took place on 27 September 2009. In 2009, English PEN established the PEN/Pinter Prize, PEN Pinter Prize, which is awarded annually to a British writer or a writer resident in Britain who, in the words of Pinter's Nobel speech, casts an 'unflinching, unswerving' gaze upon the world, and shows a 'fierce intellectual determination ... to define the real truth of our lives and our societies'. The prize is shared with an international writer of courage. The inaugural winners of the prize were Tony Harrison and the Burmese poet and comedian Zarganar, Maung Thura (a.k.a. Zarganar).


''Being Harold Pinter''

In January 2011 ''Being Harold Pinter'', a theatrical collage of excerpts from Pinter's dramatic works, his Nobel Lecture, and letters of Belarusian prisoners, created and performed by the Belarus Free Theatre, evoked a great deal of attention in the public media. The Free Theatre's members had to be smuggled out of Minsk, owing to a government crackdown on dissident artists, to perform their production in a two-week sold-out engagement at La MaMa in New York as part of the 2011 Under the Radar Festival. In an additional sold-out benefit performance at the Public Theater, co-hosted by playwrights Tony Kushner and Tom Stoppard, the prisoner's letters were read by ten guest performers: Mandy Patinkin, Kevin Kline, Olympia Dukakis, Lily Rabe, Linda Emond, Josh Hamilton (actor), Josh Hamilton, Stephen Spinella, Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. In solidarity with the Belarus Free Theatre, collaborations of actors and theatre companies joined in offering additional benefit readings of ''Being Harold Pinter'' across the United States.


The Harold Pinter Theatre, London

In September 2011, British Theatre owners, Ambassador Theatre Group (ATG) announced it was renaming its ''Comedy Theatre'', Panton Street, London to become ''The Harold Pinter Theatre''. Howard Panter, Joint CEO and Creative Director of ATG told the BBC, "The work of Pinter has become an integral part of the history of the Comedy Theatre. The re-naming of one of our most successful West End theatres is a fitting tribute to a man who made such a mark on British theatre who, over his 50 year career, became recognised as one of the most influential modern British dramatists."


Honours

An Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and an Honorary Fellow of the Modern Language Association, Modern Language Association of America (1970), Pinter was appointed Order of the British Empire, CBE in 1966 and became a Order of the Companions of Honour, Companion of Honour in 2002, having declined a knighthood in 1996. In 1995, he accepted the David Cohen Prize, in recognition of a lifetime of literary achievement. In 1996, he received a Laurence Olivier Awards, Laurence Olivier Special Award for lifetime achievement in the theatre. In 1997 he became a British Academy of Film and Television Arts, BAFTA Fellow. He received the World Leaders Award for "Creative Genius" as the subject of a week-long "Homage" in Toronto, in October 2001. In 2004, he received the Wilfred Owen Award for Poetry for his "lifelong contribution to literature, 'and specifically for his collection of poetry entitled ''War'', published in 2003'". In March 2006, he was awarded the Europe Theatre Prize in recognition of lifetime achievements pertaining to drama and theatre. In conjunction with that award, the critic Michael Billington coordinated an international conference on Pinter: Passion, Poetry, Politics, including scholars and critics from Europe and the Americas, held in Turin, Italy, from 10 to 14 March 2006. In October 2008, the Central School of Speech and Drama announced that Pinter had agreed to become its president and awarded him an Honorary title (academic), honorary fellowship at its graduation ceremony. On his appointment, Pinter commented: "I was a student at Central in 1950–51. I enjoyed my time there very much and I am delighted to become president of a remarkable institution." But he had to receive that honorary degree, his 20th, in absentia owing to ill health. His presidency of the school was brief; he died just two weeks after the graduation ceremony, on 24 December 2008. In 2013 he was posthumously awarded the Sretenje Order of Serbia.


Nobel Prize in Literature


Légion d'honneur

On 18 January 2007, French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin presented Pinter with France's highest civil honour, the
Légion d'honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...
, at a ceremony at the French embassy in London. De Villepin praised Pinter's poem "American Football" (1991) stating: "With its violence and its cruelty, it is for me one of the most accurate images of war, one of the most telling metaphors of the temptation of imperialism and violence." In response, Pinter praised France's opposition to the war in Iraq. M. de Villepin concluded: "The poet stands still and observes what doesn't deserve other men's attention. Poetry teaches us how to live and you, Harold Pinter, teach us how to live." He said that Pinter received the award particularly "because in seeking to capture all the facets of the human spirit, [Pinter's] works respond to the aspirations of the French public, and its taste for an understanding of man and of what is truly universal". Lawrence Pollard observed that "the award for the great playwright underlines how much Mr Pinter is admired in countries like France as a model of the uncompromising radical intellectual".


Scholarly response

Some scholars and critics challenge the validity of Pinter's critiques of what he terms "the modes of thinking of those in power" or dissent from his retrospective viewpoints on his own work. In 1985, Pinter recalled that his early act of conscientious objection resulted from being "terribly disturbed as a young man by the Cold War. And McCarthyism ... A profound hypocrisy. 'They' the monsters, 'we' the good. In 1948, the Russian suppression of Eastern Europe was an obvious and brutal fact, but I felt very strongly then and feel as strongly now that we have an obligation to subject our own actions and attitudes to an equivalent critical and moral scrutiny." Scholars agree that Pinter's dramatic rendering of power relations results from this scrutiny. Cf., e.g., Batty, "Preface" (xvii–xix) and chap. 6–9 (55–221) in ''About Pinter''; Grimes 19, 36–71, 218–20, and ''passim''. Pinter's aversion to any censorship by "the authorities" is epitomised in Petey's line at the end of ''The Birthday Party''. As the broken-down and reconstituted Stanley is being carted off by the figures of authority Goldberg and McCann, Petey calls after him, "Stan, don't let them tell you what to do!" Pinter told Gussow in 1988, "I've lived that line all my damn life. Never more than now."Quoted in Merritt, ''Pinter in Play'' 179. The example of Pinter's stalwart opposition to what he termed "the modes of thinking of those in power"—the "brick wall" of the "minds" perpetuating the "status quo"—infused the "vast political pessimism" that some academic critics may perceive in his artistic work, its "drowning landscape" of harsh contemporary realities, with some residual "hope for restoring the dignity of man." As Pinter's long-time friend David Jones reminded analytically inclined scholars and dramatic critics, Pinter was one of the "great comic writers": His dramatic conflicts present serious implications for his characters and his audiences, leading to sustained inquiry about "the point" of his work and multiple "critical strategies" for developing interpretations and stylistic analyses of it.


Pinter research collections

Pinter's unpublished manuscripts and letters to and from him are held in the Harold Pinter Archive in the Modern Literary Manuscripts division of the British Library. Smaller collections of Pinter manuscripts are in the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, the University of Texas at Austin; Indiana University (Bloomington), The Lilly Library, Indiana University (Bloomington), Indiana University at Bloomington; the Mandeville Special Collections Library, Geisel Library, at the University of California, San Diego; the British Film Institute, in London; and the Margaret Herrick Library, Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Beverly Hills, California.


List of works and bibliography


See also

*
International PEN PEN International (known as International PEN until 2010) is a worldwide association of writers, founded in London in 1921 to promote friendship and intellectual co-operation among writers everywhere. The association has autonomous Internatio ...
*PEN Pinter Prize *Jewish left *List of Jewish Nobel laureates


References


Works cited

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *


Further reading


Editions

*Pinter, Harold. ''Plays: One'' , '' The Birthday Party, The Room, The Dumb Waiter, A Slight Ache, The Hothouse, A Night Out''. (London: Methuen, 1983) Contains an introductory essay, ''Writing for the Theatre''. *Pinter, Harold. ''Plays: Two'' , ''
The Caretaker ''The Caretaker'' is a play in three acts by Harold Pinter. Although it was the sixth of his major works for stage and television, this psychological study of the confluence of power, allegiance, innocence, and corruption among two brothers a ...
, The Collection, The Lover, Night School, The Dwarfs''. (London: Eyre Methuen, 1979) Contains an introductory essay, ''Writing for Myself''. *Pinter, Harold. ''Plays: Three'' , '' The Homecoming, The Tea Party, The Basement, Landscape, Silence''. (London: Eyre Methuen, 1978)


Works of criticism

*Naismith, Bill (ed.) ''Harold Pinter: Faber Critical Guide:
The Caretaker ''The Caretaker'' is a play in three acts by Harold Pinter. Although it was the sixth of his major works for stage and television, this psychological study of the confluence of power, allegiance, innocence, and corruption among two brothers a ...
, The Birthday Party, The Homecoming'' (London: Faber and Faber, 2000). Contains introductory essays and explanatory notes.


External links

* * * * *
International Harold Pinter Society
(Allied Organization of the Modern Language Association, co-publisher of ''The Pinter Review'')
"Harold Pinter"
at Granta (collection of useful links)
"Harold Pinter"
at ''guardian.co.uk'' ("The best of The Guardian's coverage, including tributes, reviews and articles from the archive," periodically updated)
"Harold Pinter"
in "Times Topics" at ''The New York Times, nytimes.com'' (periodically updated collection of news articles, reviews, commentaries, photographs, and Web resources from ''The New York Times'' )
"Harold Pinter"
on ''The Mark Shenton Show'', ''TheatreVoice'', recorded on 21 February 2007 (critics Michael Billington and Alastair Macaulay review ''Pinter's People'' and '' The Dumb Waiter''; director and actor Harry Burton talks about his experiences with Pinter)
"Reputations: Harold Pinter"
on ''TheatreVoice'', recorded on 14 October 2005 (critical assessments by Michael Billington, Dan Rebellato, Charles Spencer (journalist), Charles Spencer and Ian Smith)
Working with Pinter, 2007 film by Harry Burton


''British Library Online Gallery: What's On'', British Library, 8 September 2008 (Pinter discusses his memories of postwar British theatre with Harry Burton)
Harold Pinter
Nobel Luminaries - Jewish Nobel Prize Winners, on th
Beit Hatfutsot-The Museum of the Jewish People
Website. *
List of Works
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