The Caretaker and setting (Buddha)

The life in post-war period has been adverse due to the catalyst World War II for the infliction of human suffering. The period in the second half of the 20th century has been an awful stage copious in predicament and misery. Harold Pinter and other absurdist playwrights have investigated the circumstances in the post-war period in which every kind of suffering haunted the humans. Existential dilemma has been the main problem that kept the human movement twisting—for they have to earn to keep their being. Breakdown of communication and identity crisis has been the issue among the people of 20th century, and is aptly reflected in the play. The attitude of hegemony found among individuals is revealed mostly through the episodes of the play.

Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2013

The action of the play takes place in a junk-filled room of a tumbledo Hern, 1982:21). Inner guilt is a cry for, identity, security and existence. In The Caretaker, all these terms are defined by the relationship among Davies, Aston and Mick. The sense of guilt is underlined by the lack of identity positions and, to an extent, by their clinging reliance on physical objects. It is significant that we are not introduced to the characters by way of a formal exposition. This would imply that they are familiar and known from the beginning. The sense of guilt does not only bel Davies from the Paradise has uprooted him not only in the ontological aspect but also in the psychological respect. Davies himself is not an innocent victim but a victimizer too. He is a victim of a system, which gives him a name but forces him to use another. He combats injustice with inertia and self-righteousness. This article aims at analyzing the play, The Caretaker.

IJELLH, 2019

Harold Pinter has explored violence on many levels, ranging from the most palpable, visible forms to the most subtle. Taking recourse to Johan Galtung's theory of violence and its typology as presented in his violence triangle, I have attempted to probe in this paper how direct, structural and cultural violence is projected in Pinter's play, The Caretaker. Direct violence, which has a visibility factor is most often related to the invisible cultural and structural violence and is time and again the outcome of these subtle forms of violence. But it is a fact that direct violence does not affect many people as cultural and structural violence, which constitute the hidden but major part of the iceberg. The world has faced more violence through racism, poverty, religious fanaticism, unemployment, famine, illiteracy, sexism, conservative ideologies and so on. The paper attempts to establish that Pinter has through the play, The Caretaker, has presented a keen vision of our essentially violent world, which is intensified by the notion of menace and man's basic insecurity. Harold Pinter, the 2005 Nobel Laureate for literature, was not only a popular playwright, poet, screenwriter, short story writer, director, actor etc. but also a political activist who fought against the abuse of power in the familial, social and political sphere. As a pacifist, Pinter had always fought against violence, torture, and oppression. In his early comedies of menace, the latter political plays as well as his anti-war poems, an element of disillusionment

Journal of emerging technologies and innovative research, 2018

Dr. Mangesh R. Adgokar Assistant Professor Department of English G. S. Tompe Arts, Commerce & Science College, Chandur Bazar. Abstract: Harold Pinter is one of the few dramatists of the second half of the twentieth century who has been the most and foremost influential English playwright since Bernard Shaw on English stage. The work of Harold Pinter remains amongst the most respected and authentic representation of modern man not only in British theatre, but in the theatre of the world even today after his death. His place in British Drama was strongly secured after Martin Esslin’s acknowledgement of him in his celebrated book ‘The Theatre of the Absurd’ in 1960. His plays are an image of the emptiness of human relationship and meaningless effort of man to reconcile with the situation. They better represent the unsatisfying desire of man to find the peaceful haven for secluded life where they find everything at their command. The present paper is an elaborate discussion on Pinter’s ...

2015

I wish to thank wholeheartedly Cos Tonmoy who shared his ideas on postmodernism with me and lent me a number of books and materials. I would like to extend my thanks to my friends Asif Newaz, Maroof Ibn Mannan, Borhan Uddin and Parvin Akter who motivated me at times of distress. Finally, I want to thank my father for his endless support and my mother, who prayed for me and encouraged me throughout my project with great enthusiasm. vi

Definition of modern man: Modern Man is indefinable. He is bunch of certain capabilities which are flexible and one is frequently replaced by another when caught in the whirlpool of flux of society. 1. Any man is a Modern man if he is capable of dropping the Hydrogen Bomb and Atom Bomb on innocent people without any shame or guilt. While doing the act he thinks that he is playing God. 2. Any man who is buying land on the Moon and Mars is a Modern Man. 3. Modern Man thinks that once he was Ape Man and in the future one day he would be Super Man, only he has to grasp more than he can hold. He believes in the Theory of Evolution.

Acta Neophilologica

The Caretaker is one of Harald Pinter's early plays. It was an immediate success, and it drew the attention of many critics, who started judging this contemporary British playwright's works from a new perspective. Therefore, many scholars consider The Caretaker an important turning point in the reception of Pinter's works. The play has seen many stagings all over the world, two of them in Slovenia. This article sets out its most prominent productions, analyses and comments on their critical reviews, and compares these to the response to Pinter in Slovene cultural space.

This article introduces Pinter as an early practitioner of the Theater of the Absurd as well as an existentialist. In his plays The Dumb Waiter, The Room and Birthday Party absurd is presented in its different aspects and faced by different characters. Sometimes this absurdity is funny but the dramatist's aim is to get into reality. Another aspect of Pinter's plays is existentialism. His Pinteresque characters show his multi-dimensional way of looking at life.

Ufuk Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi Yıl:9 Sayı:17 , 2020

In modern societies, it can be observed that individuals suffer from alienation and loss of communication. Apart from individual differences, social and cultural conditions are assumed among the reasons behind mental disorders, psychological distress and neurotic disabilities. In this study, the role of society and authoritative forces will be questioned to scrutinize the core reasons behind the neurotic disorders through correlating the concepts of social theory of alienation and the Freudian psychoanalytic theory of neurosis. Therefore, The Caretaker (1960), by Harold Pinter, will be examined by taking into consideration the internal and external forces in individuals’ life. The paper aims to examine and interpret the play from the Freudian psychoanalytic perspective in order to disclose the effect of external forces on individuals’ psyche under the condition of oppression and authoritative forces. In the first place, the study touches shortly upon the Freudian Psychoanalytic Theory and the Theatre of the Absurd and then gives brief information about the play, The Caretaker. Later, the study dwells on the analysis of the play from the point of the Freudian Psychoanalytic Theory. Key Words: The Caretaker, Freud, Psychoanalysis, society, neurotic disorder, alienation.

A Kaleidoscope of Harold Pinter's Plays, 1992

Critics have tried to approach Pinter’s plays from a variety of changing perspectives, which emerge as a result of the playwright’s inventiveness. Pinter who aims at and achieves perhaps the most original innovations in dramatic form best exemplifies the range and diversity of the contemporary English drama. In consequence, he has created a distinctive personal style. Any attempt to make an exhaustive study of Harold Pinter at this stage would be futile; selection was inevitable. This dissertation will concentrate on eight plays by the playwright under discussion to demonstrate the refinement and development of his technique which was unprecedented and therefore shocked everybody in 1960s but is highly appreciated now. Ankara : Faculty of Letters and Institute of Economics and Social Sciences, Bilkent Univ., 1992.