A true genius has passed away. Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter died Christmas Eve at the age of 78.
His haunting, evocative, and sometimes alarming plays (The Birthday Party, The Homecoming, The Caretaker, The Dumbwaiter, A Kind of Alaska, and dozens more) stand out as singular accomplishments in contemporary serious drama. He also made his distinctive mark as an actor, director, poet, screenwriter, and social activist. His plays and other works captured, in startling relief, the profound problems humans have communicating with each other. His characters famously told different versions of their own stories in different scenes, contradicted others and themselves, worked furiously at accomplishing very little, and, quite famously, took awkward pauses when language failed them utterly. Here's to the memory and brilliant work of a great man.
Photograph courtesy of m1ndy9876 under a Creative Commons License. Shared rights © 2008 by Abingdon and Witney College & Richard Davies.
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