The Caretaker by Pinter Essay -- essays research papers

The Caretaker by Pinter: A Play Can Be Confrontational, Challenging and Disturbing to the Values and Assumptions of An Audience. Discuss With close Reference The Caretaker, written by the British playwright Harold Pinter in the late 1950's and early 1960's disrupts the audiences perceptions of existence and their understandings of it. The play deconstructs perceived notions and conceptions of reality, and disturbs the audiences perception of their own identity and place within a world which is primarily concerned with the search and need for identity. Pinter was clearly influenced by the fashionable philosophic review of human condition that was prominent in the 1950's and 1960's – existentialism. The play attacks the notion that there are no absolute truths or realities. Pinter is therefore concerned with what exists as unknown and intangible to humanity. His theatre interrogates the truth of nature and realities of language and demonstrates that much of what the audience regards as fact is fiction as he explores the uncertainty of human existence. When an audience of the 1960's went to the theatre, it can generally be assumed that they had preconceived ideas about what they expected and what they are going to gain from the theatrical experience. The traditional attitudes towards theatre and the conventions of realist drama are disrupted by Pinter. This confronts the assumptions and values of the audience, an experience which would be disconcerting and frightening to many. Pinter divorces and exposes society's codes, institutions and human relations. Throughout the play the audience is rarely comfortable. This disruption is established from the outset of the play when Mick, a character who at this stage of the play the audience knows nothing about, sits on the bed and stares at the audience in silence for ‘30 seconds'. Traditionally in realist drama such as Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler characters use simple exposition through language and non-verbal elements to ‘let the audience in' and enlighten them on what is happening on the stage and the results and reasons for and behind actions. Pinter disrupts this tradition and this in itself would have been a disturbing phenomena to the conservative audiences of post-war Britain. Mick's arrival on stage generates unease within the audience and the tension would only increase as Pinter provides the audience with... ...entity and the structure of society. This deferral of action is primarily indicated by Davies and Aston. The prime example of this is in Davies constant references to his planned trip to Sidcup and in Aston's references to the shed that he is planning to build. Through the representation of these possible future activities, it appears that it gives purpose to their current actions and to some extent a reason for living. It allows these characters to suggest that they are in fact worthwhile human beings with a purpose and a ‘life'. Pinter suggests through this deferral of actions that people's lives hold no worthwhile meaning and ultimately there is nothing gained at the point of death. The Caretaker is a subversive play that demythologises many of an audiences assumptions and values. Pinter makes the audience experience paranoia and feelings of menace and by disrupting conventions of social behaviour and ignoring traditional dramatic ‘realist' protocol, Pinter confronts and challenges the values and assumptions of an audience. He successfully deconstructs notions of power and security, and problematises the conservative belief that there are in fact absolute truths and realities.