HAROLD PINTER: THE BIRTHDAY PARTY

This is one of the plays of Harold Pinter's maturity. It has all the characteristics of his earlier One Act plays, but it has longer action that seems to grow from one situation to another naturally and a complex philosophical texture. That is the beauty of the action of the play. It grows smoothly though it has jolts of quite a different kind for the audience. By and large to an extent the action is light hearted and there is lot of comedy at the verbal and situational level, yet all this turns into very grim and menacing in effect as the action grows towards it culmination. There are just three or four main characters involved in the action of the play, but a lot about them remains shrouded in some sort of mystery, their actions are not readily logical; so that the characters and the whole action of the play can be interpreted in several different ways with change of perspective. The relationship between Stanley Webb and Meg, between Stanley and the intruder guests, Goldberg and McCann is mystery only hinted to be unravelled towards the end. The mundane Meg and her husband have their share of the pedestrian humour they create, and their role in the action and revelation of the darker aspects of the action, which they only help in unfolding by their interaction with the chief characters of the play. Thus there is a lot of action that is happening in the shadow of mystery and this causes existential fear of the unknown. A lot is left to the imagination of the audience to resolve and interpret and understand from their own standpoint. Dr. S.C. Narula has been a distinguished teacher of English language and literature in the University of Delhi, where he taught for more than thirty years. He is an elected fellow of the International Academy of Poets in Cambridge, England and listed in the International Who’s Who of Poetry, Cambridge. He has long association with the Sahitya Akademi, the premier Academy of Letters of India and has written several articles and reviews for the official journal Indian Literature. He has presented learned academic papers in conferences where he has been a University invitee.

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