Examines the screenplays of the master British dramatist and screenwriter Harold Pinter.

This important book offers a thematic collection of critical essays, ideal for undergraduate courses on modern British theatre, on Harold Pinter's theatrical works, alongside new interviews with contemporary theatre practitioners. The life and works of Harold Pinter (1930–2008), a pivotal figure in British theatre, have been widely discussed, debated and celebrated internationally. For over five decades, Pinter's work traversed and redefined various forms and genres, constantly in dialogue with, and often impacting the work of, other writers, artists and activists. Combining a reconsideration of key Pinter scholarship with new contexts, voices and theoretical approaches, this book opens up fresh insights into the author's work, politics, collaborations and his enduring status as one of the world's foremost dramatists. Three sections re-contextualize Pinter as a cultural figure; explore and interrogate his influence on contemporary British playwriting; and offer a series of original interviews with theatre-makers engaging in the staging of Pinter's work today. Reconsiderations of Pinter's relationship to literary and theatrical movements such as Modernism and the Theatre of the Absurd; interrogations of the role of class, elitism and religious and cultural identity sit alongside chapters on Pinter's personal politics, specifically in relation to the Middle East.

Harold Pinter's work forms a cornerstone of the dramatic literature of the contemporary British stage. This book offers a critical examination of his dramatic writing over four decades, from The Room (1957) to Ashes to Ashes (1996).

Harold Pinter provides an up-to-date analysis and reappraisal concerning the work of one of the most studied and performed dramatists in the world. Drawing extensively from The Harold Pinter Archive at the British Library as well as reviews and other critical materials, this book offers new insights into previously established views about his work. The book also analyses and reappraises specific key historical and contemporary productions, including a selection of Pinter’s most significant screenplays. In particular, this volume seeks to assess Pinter’s critical reputation and legacy since his death in 2008. These include his position as a political writer and political activist – from disassociation and neutrality on the subject until relatively late in his career when his drama sought to explicitly address questions of political dissent and torture by totalitarian regimes. The book revisits some familiar territories such as Pinter’s place as a British absurdist and the role memory plays in his work, but it also sets out to explore new territories such as Pinter’s changing attitudes towards gender in the light of #MeToo and queer politics and how in particular a play such as The Caretaker (1960) through several key productions has brought the issues of race into sharper focus. Part of the Routledge Modern and Contemporary Dramatist series, Harold Pinter provides an essential and accessible guide to the dramatists’ work.

Harold Pinter is one of the most important writers in English of the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century. This brief biography offers fresh insights into his life and work, concentrating on the themes, patterns, relationships, ideas and language common to his life and creative output. Placing Pinter's life and work alongside each other, the study illuminates Pinter's vision of society, politics, gender, sex, violence and human relationships. Drawing upon the full-range of his work, his letters, journalism, and writings about him, Baker combines a biographical approach with close (re)readings of his work to create a fresh perspective on his life and art. The book offers students, academics and readers a rich depiction of Harold Pinter, the man and the writer.

This volume is the first to provide a book-length study of Pinter’s overtly political activity. With chapters on political drama, poetry, and speeches, it charts a consistent tension between aesthetics and politics through Pinter’s later career and defines the politics of the work in terms of a pronounced sensory dimension and capacity to affect audiences. The book brings to light unpublished letters and drafts from the Pinter Archive in the British Library and draws his political poems and speeches, which have previously been overshadowed by his plays, into the foreground. Intended for students, instructors, and researchers in drama and theatre, performance studies, literature, and media studies, this book celebrates Pinter’s later life and work by discerning a coherent political voice and project and by registering the complex ways that project troubles the divide between aesthetics and politics.

This book charts the impact of Shakespeare’s works on Harold Pinter’s career as a playwright. This exploration traces Shakespeare’s influence through Pinter’s pre-theatre writings (1950-1956), to his collaboration with Sir Peter Hall (starting properly at the RSC in 1962 and continuing until 1983), and a late, unpublished screenplay for an adaptation of The Tragedy of King Lear (2000). Adding to studies of playwrights such as Samuel Beckett and James Joyce as significant influences on Harold Pinter’s work, this study aims to highlight the significant and lasting impact that Shakespeare had both formatively and performatively on the playwright’s career. Through exploring this influence, Morton gains not only a greater understanding of the shaping of Pinter’s artistic outlook and how this affected his writing, but it also sheds light on the various forms of Shakespeare’s continued influence on new writing, and what can be gained from this. This study will be of great interest to students and scholars in theatre and performance studies.

This Reader's Guide synthesises the key criticism on Pinter's work over the last half century. Andrew Wyllie and Catherine Rees examine critical approaches and reactions to the major plays, charting the controversies which have arisen in response to Pinter's critiques of political and sexual issues. They consider criticism from the press and academics, on the themes of Absurdism, politics and gender identity. By placing this criticism in its historical context, this guide illustrates a transition from bewilderment and outrage to affection, fascination - and more outrage.

The most detailed chronological account of Harold Pinter to appear, this new volume in the Author Chronologies series traces the daily activities of the Nobel Prize winning author. It is based upon published and unpublished materials, and discussion with his close friends, and is a basic reference tool for all Pinter students and scholars.

The Theatre of Harold Pinter offers a unique assesment of one of Britain's most influential dramatists, combining a chronological survey of Pinter's entire work for the stage with a series of incisive critical essays from leading scholars.