HAROLD PINTER - Joshua Ruebl

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In his 1963 play The Lover; Pinter gives us the story of Richard and Sarah, a suburban middle-class couple. Richard is the typical thirty-something commuter, seemingly cold and detached. Sarah is the traditional housewife. At the beginning of the play, we see Sarah cleaning the house with a feather duster, setting the tableau as an icon of domesticity. Richard enters the scene, destabilizing the middle-class veneer by uttering amiably “Is your lover coming today?” (I, Pinter, pg. 161) Richard is leaving for work, knowing that his wife will be alone in the afternoon with another man. Here, as Victor Cahn asserts “one tension of the play is established: that between uncivilized passion and constricting social decorum.” (Cahn pg. 44) Here, Pinter sets up a world of seemingly blissful bourgeois tranquility and then immediately shatters it by allowing in a new, more primal reality. After this short scene, we see Sarah alone, mixing a drink, wearing the same clothing as the first scene, with one exception: she is wearing a pair of high-heeled shoes. This is the first break in the realistic image that Pinter sets, letting the secrets of their relationship come to the surface. This is the first instance where Sarah dons the costume of the whore archetype. Richard comes home, sets his briefcase down, and is brought a drink by Sarah as he reads the paper. The conversation begins with polite chatter: SARAH: Tired? RICHARD: Just a little. SARAH: Bad traffic? RICHARD: No. Quite good traffic actually. Very smooth. (Pinter, pg. 162.) Again, Pinter begins the scene with a display of traditional domestic tranquility- the husband returns from work, the wife provides the drink and the meal. Everything 4
seems to be in balance: husband and wife are in their place, and the evening routine is starting. However, Richard shatters the illusion with the question: “Did you show him the hollyhocks?” This surprises Sarah, and it is possibly the first time Richard has been this inquisitive in regards to Sarah’s meetings with her lover. The conversation continues, as Richard delves deeper and deeper into Sarah’s secret relations, first by making small talk about the blinds, and the sun making the room hot, which is a subtle reference to the nature of Sarah’s encounters with her lover. Sarah becomes increasingly unnerved by this exchange: RICHARD: Oh by the way...I rather wanted to ask you something. SARAH: What? RICHARD: Does it ever occur to you that while you’re spending the afternoon being unfaithful to me I’m sitting at a desk going through balance sheets and graphs? SARAH: What a funny question. RICHARD: No, I’m curious. SARAH: You’ve never asked me that before. RICHARD: I’ve always wanted to know. (Pinter, pg. 165.) Richard seems at this point in the play, to be displaying a feeling of jealously towards Sarah’s relationship with her other man. At this point, the ritual of the play involves simple domestic chores and amiable chatter, but then the dialogue about the hollyhocks and then the various questions about the nature of Sarah’s relationship with her lover seem almost rehearsed by the couple. The interrogation is more of the ritual’s opening incantation, taking the game to the next level. Richard, through his emotion and 5
Page 1 and 2: Rituals of Gender and Power in the
Page 3: of Post-Modernism and the kind of p
Page 7 and 8: play. Within these conflicts over c
Page 9 and 10: question “Cream?” can be read a
Page 11 and 12: servant, power and submission, deve
Page 13 and 14: himself. Sarah ignores him, retaini
Page 15 and 16: internal struggle for both intimacy
Page 17 and 18: This play represents a change in at
Page 19 and 20: these, along with the card, particu
Page 21 and 22: us all happy. We’d take it in tur
Page 23 and 24: ealism that borders on the surreal.
Page 25 and 26: RUTH: I won’t go far. I’ll come
Page 27 and 28: “Well, to sum up everything was i
Page 29 and 30: Jewish heritage, and Ruth, a gentil
Page 31 and 32: contentment, an image mocked throug
Page 33 and 34: Oedipal phase (in which the young c
Page 35 and 36: that she is back in her own environ
Page 37 and 38: model for the body.” (Pinter, pg.
Page 39 and 40: due to her role in the patriarchal
Page 41 and 42: Ruth as prostitute is all part of a
Page 43 and 44: name means ‘of the night.’ Haro
Page 45 and 46: Stella and Sarah in his earlier wor
Page 47 and 48: BIBLIOGRAPY Almansi, G. and S. Hend
Page 49 and 50: Durham: Duke University Press, 1990

HAROLD PINTER - Joshua Ruebl

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