The Caretaker by Harold Pinter

CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH DRAMATISTS– SESSION TEN

AMIRMOHAMMAD MOHAMAMDI
Biography of 2
Harold Pinter

Contemporary English Drama– Session Ten

 Born October 10, 1930, Hackney, London
 A British playwright, screenwriter, director, and actor.
 A working-class neighborhood
 A ladies’ tailor father and a homemaker mother
 One of the most prominent figures in Absurdism.
 His plays are reputed for their small talks, understatements, and
reticence.
 The real meaning of his characters’ speech lies beneath several
layers.
Biography of 3

Harold Pinter - 2

Contemporary English Drama – Session Ten

 Taking part in Hackney Downs Grammar School where he
excelled in acting, writing, and sports.
 Studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1948 situated
in London. So many celebrities have been graduated from this
institute such as Tom Hiddleston, Aimee Lou Wood, and James
Norton to name a few.
 Leaving the Royal Academy after two terms so as to join a
repertory company as a professional thespian.
 Touring Ireland and England with various acting companies until
1959.
Pinteresque Plays 4

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

 Utmost representative of British Drama in the second half of 20th
century.
 Restoration of play to its basic elements: An enclosed space and
an unpredictable dialogue.
 Volatility and elusiveness of the past are inseparable parts of his
plays.
 His plays have enjoyed success with both audiences and critics.
 Death: December 24, 2008, in London due to cancer based on his
wife’s claim.
Absurdism 5

in Lens

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

 Movement Origin: 1950
 First coined by Martin Esslin, who identified common features of a
new style of drama that seemed to ignore theatrical conventions.
 Main features:
1. Departure from realistic characters and situations
2. No clear notion of time or place in which the action occurs
3. Nameless characters who are often nameless and seem
interchangeable
4. Nonsense dialogues among characters
Representative writers of 6

Absurdism

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

 Samuel Beckett (1906-1989)
 Eugene Ionesco (1912-1994)
 Jean Genet (1910-1986)
 Arthur Adamov (1908-1970)
 Harold Pinter (1930-2008)
 Edward Albee (1928-2016)
 Fernando Arrabal (1932)
 Vaclav Havel (1936)
 7
Themes of Absurdism

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

 1. Absurdity:
A world that no longer makes sense to its inhabitants, in which rational
decisions are impossible and all actions are meaningless and futile.
2. Domination:
Master/servant relationships is an inseparable part of the Absurd
Literature, in which, you see the pairs on of whom is dominator and
another dominated. The clear models are Pozzo/Lucky, Hamm/Clov,
and in Albee’s The American Dream Mommy/Daddy.

 3. Loneliness and Isolation:

Majority of Absurdist works depict the loneliness and isolation of
individuals, stemming from the nature of the modern life and the
improbability of effectual communication between human beings.
Style of Absurdism 8

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

1. Character: It abandons traditional character development to
offer figures who have no clear identity or distinguishing
features. Moreover, they may even be interchangeable as the
characters do so in Waiting for Godot.
2. Denouement: Since so little happens in most absurdist works,
the denouement has little to resolve. Thus, endings tend to be
repetitious, such as the almost identical ending of both acts of
Waiting for Godot.
3. Dialogue: Since the ability of language to convey meaning is
questioned by Absurdism, dialogue is of special importance in
Absurdist works. The language is artificial, meaningless, and
there is a noticeable contradiction between speech and action.
Absurdism & Existentialism 9

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

 Absurdism is often linked to Existentialism, the philosophical
movement associated with Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus.
Both Existentialists and Absurdists are concerned with the
senselessness of the human condition. Of course there is a
difference. The philosophers explores the irrational nature of
human existence within the rational framework while the
Absurdists looked for illogic in both form and content.
An overview of 10

The Caretaker

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

• Harold Pinter’s first major success.
• Written in 1960 and published that same year by Encore
Publishing.
• Premiered at the Arts Theatre Club in London in April 1960.
• It is somehow an autobiographical play. (first analysis)
• It’s lauded for depicting well different themes such as loneliness
and isolation, failure of communication, violence and threat,
human nature so on and so forth.
The Caretaker in Lens; 11

Non-verbal Communication

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

• Every Stage direction in Pinter’s plays-without exception-is vital
and meaningful. To prove my claim, just consider this quotation
from an eminent professor of Theatre and Drama at University of
Michigan who wrote many critical literary pieces, I mean, John
Russell Brown.
• “Pinter was an actor long before he was a playwright and that he
is particularly aware of the power and importance of subtle
gestures and actions.”
 Funny up to a Point 12

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

• In a letter to London Sunday Times: “ As far as I’m concerned The
Caretaker is funny up to a point. Beyond that point it ceases to
be funny, and it was because of that point that I wrote it.”
• But where is “that point”?
Silence. They do not move.
Aston comes in. He closes the door, moves into the room and faces
Mick. They look at each other. Both are smiling , faintly (p.74-5).
* After this stage direction, the play quickly ends while Davies is
incoherent and helpless. This faint smile absolutely validates both
the game structure and the vicious, conscious cruelty of the game.
Conspiracy Against Davies - 13

Quotation

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

• “ When the curtain rises, Mick alone is silently
and expressionlessly surveying the contents of
the room. When he hears Aston and Davies
below, he quietly goes out before they arrive.
If he was really concerned about Aston’s
condition, he would have stayed to see whom
Aston was bringing home, but in fact he has
been making a final check of the preparations
for the game he and Aston are about to play.”
• Robert P. Murphy. 2009
 References 14

Contemporary English Drama - Session Ten

• Banarjee, R. B., “ The Theatre of the Absurd,” in The Literary
Criterion, Vol. 7, No. 1, 1965, pp. 59-62
• Nasser Mahmoudi, Fatemeh Azizmohammadi, Hamedreza
Kohzadi 2012. Traces of Guilt, Identity, Security, and Existence in
Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker
• Banker, B.K., “ The Theatre of the Absurd and Existentialism: An
Overview,” in Indian Journal of American Studies, Vol. 26, No 2,
Summer 1996, pp. 445-49
• Robert P. Murphy 2014. Non-verbal communication and the
overlooked action the Pinter’s The Caretaker
• Graham Woodroffe 1988. Taking Care of the Coloureds: The
Political Metaphor of Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker
• [Link]