Pinter who?

October 13, 2005 4:12 AM

It's Pinter. The Nobel Prize in Literature is awarded to the English writer Harold Pinter, “who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression’s closed rooms”.
posted by Termite (34 comments total)

"War.
Bombs.
Bugger the war.
Bugger the bombs.

Bomb the buggers.
Bugger Bush.
Watch your backs, fellas.
And bugger Bush.

(Did I mention that already?)

Bugger."

(HP, May 2003 (very possibly...))
posted by klaatu at 4:14 AM on October 13, 2005

Haroldpinter.org
Wikipedia
posted by mr.marx at 4:14 AM on October 13, 2005

I was just about to post the same thing: here's the press release (PDF). Pinter's official site; Pinter @ wikipedia. Previous prize announcements @ MeFi: 2004, 2003, 2002. Full list of past laureates.
posted by misteraitch at 4:16 AM on October 13, 2005

So he's been dumbly waiting for this all these years? [obvious]
posted by clevershark at 4:25 AM on October 13, 2005

And here I thought it was the Indian dude that Elaine dated.
posted by antifuse at 4:32 AM on October 13, 2005

Thanks for the additional links, misteraitch!
posted by Termite at 4:44 AM on October 13, 2005

... and mr. marx. I didn't know he had an official site.
posted by Termite at 4:45 AM on October 13, 2005

Looks like I was wrong. By way of self-defense, I'll quote mefi's resident wise-man in saying:

"Well, post-Arafat, the Prize is a disgusting joke."
posted by shmegegge at 5:00 AM on October 13, 2005

shmegegge—I don’t think that even Arafat’s supporters would have ever nominated him for the Literature prize, which, in any case, is awarded by the Swedish Academy, whereas the Peace prizewinners are chosen by the Norwegian Nobel Committee.
posted by misteraitch at 5:13 AM on October 13, 2005

Good choice. It's nice to see it go to a really good dramatist.
posted by OmieWise at 5:24 AM on October 13, 2005

misteraitch - You're kidding! I could have sworn that Arafat had won the lit prize. Color me surprised.
posted by shmegegge at 5:33 AM on October 13, 2005

Wow! Good timing. My theatre company, which has never performed a play by a 20th Century writer before, has decided to launch a "Modern Classics" series. A few weeks ago, we decided to inaugurate the series by doing a couple of Pinter plays.

For those who don't know Pinter, he's a marvelous, mysterious playwright, poet and screenwriter. His language is sparse and rife with pauses, like David Mamet's (Pinter sometimes directs Mamet's plays), but Pinter is more surreal than Mamet. If you've never read him before, I recommend starting with "The Birthday Party" (there's a movie version starring Robert Shaw, who also played the famous Captain in "Jaws.") and "The Homecoming." Or rent one of the following movies: "The French Lieutenant's Woman," "The Last Tycoon," "The Servant," "Betrayal" and "Turtle Diary."
posted by grumblebee at 5:34 AM on October 13, 2005

gee, shmegegge, judicious and subtle use of sarcasm.

next time you might want not to use a trowel to apply it.
posted by the sobsister at 5:42 AM on October 13, 2005

Also see this excellent recent post on Pinter from the very prescient matteo.
posted by madamjujujive at 5:49 AM on October 13, 2005

Oh noes he'll give all that nicker to the Sandanistas! Stop him!
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 5:56 AM on October 13, 2005

He is one of my all time favourites and this prize is well deserved. He has not written anything great in my opinion for some time (like 1992) but given the incredible canon he has already graced the world with his art is for me almost above most critique. They had a thing on BBC4 with an Arena about him and repeats of all of these BBC productions and films, including many I had not seen, and I was blown away. He has become a bit politically out there, with the Milosevic defence fund et al being more than a bit sickmaking. I think his best work came was when he was not so ideologically charged, but no matter. A well deserved award for a man whose work has enriched all who are open to it.
posted by The Salaryman at 5:58 AM on October 13, 2005

After last year's debacle, I guess they went with an established favorite.
posted by The Jesse Helms at 6:41 AM on October 13, 2005

Salaryman, you've got that back to front. I'm sure Pinter would be the first to say that as a man, he is no more (nor less) important than anyone else. It's his ideology, in so far as it is correct, that gives his work power - because as we read his work, we sense that it is based on an accurate and powerful understanding of how the world works.

Pinter's work has always examined themes such as torture and mass murder, with a hearty sense just how close we, the audience, are to the torturers and the politicians who command them. Some of his audience, indeed, certainly are torturers and killers and politicians who command them, and his work addresses that chilling fact with appropriately chilling directness.

Pinter offers a clear understanding of the way that people are motivated and encouraged by society itself, throughout their lives, to support acts of "patriotic" murder and torture ... that's why his plays send shivers down our spines.

The horror stories Pinter writes carry truth, and we recognize that as we read and watch. That's why they are so much more interesting and moving than another Night of the Living Dead movie, or a Left Behind movie, or yet another nonsensical, superficial, made-for-TV rightwing cop show.

When a teenager reads the newspapers the day after watching a Pinter play, she can suddenly see a little bit more between the sparse lines in our self-censoring media. "Human rights issues". What does that mean? Watch some Pinter and you might start to get an idea.

Pinter's work is good because Pinter's ideology - his system of ideas - helps us to understand what is happening in our world. And to understand is to begin to change. Understanding and change, yes please. Congratulations to Mr Pinter on this richly deserved prize.
posted by cleardawn at 6:42 AM on October 13, 2005

Pinter: My plays examine torture with a hearty sense of just how close we are to the torturers and the politicians who command them.

Pause.

Pinter: Yes. They do.

Benny: Do they?

Pause.

Pinter: I've always liked you, Benny.

Pause.

Benny: But what do they actually say about it?

Pause.

Pinter: Like I say, Benny, I've always liked you.

Pause.

Benny: Uh...

Pause.
posted by klaatu at 6:54 AM on October 13, 2005

Cleardawn, fair enough - there are systems of thought behind all art and it is best when they are felt by the audience rather than shouted by the artist. Everything he has written has been charged in one way or another in that manner. What I meant (but poorly articulated) was after 'Party Time' (which I quite like) and 'Moonlight' his work has become less challenging just as he has become more radical in his public utterances, which is what I meant by 'ideologically charged'.
posted by The Salaryman at 7:00 AM on October 13, 2005

Actually as a Young British Playwright myself I think Pinter's ideological concerns are often very overstated. Often by the man himself. I saw him last year after a production of one his plays last year giving a very incoherent rant against globalisation with his mate Corin Redgrave sat next to him in brand spanking new Nike trainers... And his recent war poetry is very funny. Possibly intentionally, but I fear not always...

Pinter and Samuel Beckett are two writers that still sag over British playwrighting in excusing many young bluffers to write without specificity and precision. Me included, I know I've done it. And they're both writers whose work I am fantastically glad exists, but won't necessarily rush out to watch.

The exception with Pinter is perhaps Betrayal which I think is one of the finest plays of the twentieth century - and interestingly seems to come from a much more personal place.

And Pinter has been a fabulously cool force in British theatre in encouraging younger talent, such as championing Sarah Kane.

It's just that some it deserves a bit of a pinch of salt.

None of which precludes a Nobel prize for the fella of course. Good on him.
posted by klaatu at 7:04 AM on October 13, 2005

Oh, I feel much more menaced by Romero-esque zombies than Pinter-esque zombies...
posted by klaatu at 7:05 AM on October 13, 2005

Very interesting points, Klaatu. Especially the legacy of influence on others. I've made a few very bad attempts at plays when a student and the legacy of both was there in my lame derivative-ness! I have had to get out the salt as well, as it seems to me odd to be concerned with human rights while being loudly associated with organisations in bed with other organisations that would quite like to establish a Jew, gay and unveiled woman free totalitarian utopia. Still love him though and am very glad he was awarded the prize!
posted by The Salaryman at 7:21 AM on October 13, 2005

klaatu, we all deserve to be taken with a pinch of salt, myself certainly included, so thanks for adding the seasoning.

I think "ideology" is one of the most misunderstood words we have. There seem to be millions of people running around with the notion - carefully reinforced by the media - that all forms of ideology are inherently evil.

The result is that a great many people actively try to have no idea about how the world works or what should be done about it. Further, they think anyone who bothers to form such ideas is a fool, and happily tell him so.

Unfortunately, without an ideology of their own, they are merely slaves to the ideologies of others.

As William Blake put it, "I must create my own system, or else be slave to another man's."

Seems to me that having an ideology (a system of ideas about how the world works) and being willing to change and update it as new information comes in, is the first step to doing something good, in art or in any other field of human endeavour.

That's all I was really trying to say, though I probably didn't put it very well... not being a playwright myself...
posted by cleardawn at 7:28 AM on October 13, 2005

Pause.
posted by Mr Stickfigure at 7:44 AM on October 13, 2005

Sounds like a new sitcom!

"It's Pinter!"
posted by fungible at 7:57 AM on October 13, 2005

yeah, can you imagine an American sitcom scripted by Pinter? I'd die to watch that
posted by matteo at 8:27 AM on October 13, 2005

Oh my god, I'd even stop watching "America's Next Top Model" to see that!
posted by scody at 8:35 AM on October 13, 2005

I can't offer a significant pause long enough to express my feelings about this.
posted by maxsparber at 9:04 AM on October 13, 2005

My only regret about retiring from the theatre is that I was never successfully involved in a production of Victoria Station. I was once unsuccessfully involved.

I did, however, successfully direct The Room in college. Well, success in that it was actually staged. Looking back, it, like most collegiate productions, was probably fairly dreadful.
posted by Human Stain at 9:15 AM on October 13, 2005

My first reaction upon hearing that Pinter won the prize in Literature was not, as the title suggests, "Pinter Who?" but rather, "He hadn't already won?" My next reaction was, "What took them so long?"
posted by deanc at 11:30 AM on October 13, 2005

Who would have thought someone at LGF was literate.

Another Nobel Insult
Deranged “anti-war” British playwright Harold Pinter has been given the Nobel Prize for Literature.
posted by The Jesse Helms at 2:03 PM on October 13, 2005

Pinter is also a brilliant poet. Or... umm... well... used to be (I do hope that his recent anti-war poems are supposed to be that hilarious). But much of his early stuff is brilliant. I couldn't find any of my favorites online, but I typed up a poem from 1950.


New Year in the Midlands


Now here again she blows, landlady of lumping
Fellows between the boards,
Singing 'O Celestial Light', while
Like a T-square on the
Flood swings her wooden leg.
This is the shine, the powder and blood, and here am I,
Straddled, exile always in one Whitbread Ale town,
Or such.
Where we went to the yellow pub, cramped in an alley bin,
A shoot from the market,
And found the thin Luke of a queer, whose pale
Deliberate eyes, raincoat, Victorian,
Sap the answer in the palm.
All the crush, camp, burble and beer
Of this New Year's Night; the psalm derided;
The black little crab women with the long
Eyes, lisp and claw in a can of chockfull stuff.
I am rucked in the heat of treading; the well-rolled
Sailor boys soon rocked to sleep, whose ferret fig
So calms the coin of a day's fever.
Now in this quaver of a roisty bar, the wansome lady
I blust and stir,
Who pouts the bristle of a sprouting fag—
Sprinkled and diced in these Midland lights
Are Freda the whimping glassy bawd, and your spluttered guide,
Blessed with ambrosial bitter weed. —Watch
How luminous hands
Unpin the town's genitals—
Young men and old
With the beetle glance,
The crawing brass whores, the clamping
Red shirted boy, ragefull, thudding his cage.
posted by Kattullus at 2:28 PM on October 13, 2005

Senator Helms, don't you love how they prefer to read better authors like Dean Koontz and Tom Clancy? I mean, why read Pinter when there's Angels & Demons?
posted by matteo at 4:03 PM on October 13, 2005