The Plays of Harold Pinter

von Christoph Krüger

The plays of Harold Pinter, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2005, have been widely discussed by critics and theatregoers for the last 50 years. While his early plays are regarded as classical pieces of the Theatre of the Absurd, which is said to be apolitical, his later works are recognized as manifestations of political drama. Consequently, critics have suggested a "political awakening" of Pinter, trying to account for the change that occurred in his style of theatre. Taking a closer look at the origins and basic mechanisms of the Theatre of the Absurd and political drama, as well as examining representative pieces of Pinter's earlier (The Dumb Waiter, The Birthday Party) and later work (One for the Road, Mountain Language), Christoph Krüger shows that Pinter's early work can by no means be regarded as apolitical and that Absurdist features indeed are applicable to address political issues.