PINTERESQUE VS. PINTERESQUE
THE LEGACY OF HAROLD PINTER’S TRUTH
Keywords:
Pinter, Pinteresque, identity, culture, community, individual, dogmaAbstract
The paper is concerned with Harold Pinter’s apologetic discourse towards the phenomenon of “social truth”. Pinter attempts to establish the principle of truth parallel to that of a system – a truth which he considers to be hidden beneath the layers imposed by an individual’s corresponding society and culture in order to construct his/her identity. Pinter disagrees that the revelation of this sort of identity serves to form an individual’s personality: rather, its purpose is to conform him/her to the insipid and homogenous entity which is society. His approach to the problem of preservation of identity is based on usage of the absurd, i.e. a combination of meaningless actions and logorrhoeic dialogue: applying the scandal-based critique of the imperial ambitions of the regime, he believed in iconoclastic re-foundation of the truth as opposed to ideology. While aware that both the regime and his revolutionary ways have shown equal amounts of nonsensicality, Pinter has no qualms that the nonsensicality of a stranded and deceived citizen has a full right to be acknowledged as truth. His field of interest, therefore, expands to politics as well as simply literature and sociology. Resolute in his aim to contradict the ideology fawning on ruthless political leaders of the U.S. and Western European countries, Pinter uses both his dramas and speeches to debunk the myth of a “charismatic leader”, incarnating the ideology which proscribes any critical thought.
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