Abstract
It is once again the old fight with the old giant. True, he does not fight, only I fight, he only sprawls over me as a labourer does on the tavern table, crosses his arms on the upper part of my chest and presses his chin on his arms. Shall I be able to endure this load? (WPC 286)
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Notes and References
Lawrence M. Bensky, ‘Harold Pinter: An Interview’, in Pinter: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Arthur Ganz (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1972) pp. 21–2. This interview was originally published in The Paris Review 10 (Fall 1966).
Ibid., p. 22.
Pinter, interviewed by John Sherwood, BBC European Service, 3 March 1960; cited in Martin Esslin, Pinter: The Playwright (London, 1982) p. 40.
Ronald Hayman, Harold Pinter (London, 1980) p. 1.
In 1948, Pinter received his call-up papers for National Service and — to the consternation of his parents — promptly declared himself a conscientious objector. As a result, he was twice summoned to appear before a military tribunal and there was a real possibility that he would be sent to prison. However, in each of the two civil trials which followed, he was fortunate enough to encounter an unusually lenient magistrate, who decided that, since the defendant was under twenty-one, a stiff financial penalty would be more appropriate. On both occasions, Pinter Snr just about managed to scrape together the money to pay the fine. See Michael Billington, The Life and Work of Harold Pinter (London, 1996) pp. 21–4.
MIL, follows p. 75, 1. 16; cited in Jiřà Gruša, Franz Kafka of Prague (New York, 1983) p. 70.
Barry Supple, ‘Pinter’s Homecoming’, The Jewish Chronicle, 25 June 1965, p. 7.
John Lahr, ‘An Actor’s Approach: An Interview with Paul Rogers’, in ACasebook onHarold Pinter’sTheHomecoming, edited by John and Anthea Lahr (London, 1974) p. 160.
James Joyce, APortrait of theArtist as a Young Man (London, 1992) p. 183.
Charles Baudelaire, cited in François Truffaut, Jules and Jim: A Film by François Truffaut (London, 1968) p. 37.
It would seem that Ruth — whose triumphant transition from despised outsider to royal dam ironically parallels the history of her Old Testament namesake — has had her eye on Max’s seat of power from the very moment she first entered the house: TEDDY: That’s my father’s chair. RUTH: That one? (III 28) There are in fact two large armchairs in the living-room: one at the centre, the other to the right of centre. The first of these is the one that belongs to Max, and is also the one that is occupied by Ruth at the end. See French’s acting edition of The Homecoming (London, 1965) pp. 1; 8; 40–3.
Erich Heller, Kafka (London, 1974) p. 21.
According to Gustav Janouch, Kafka had summarized the play thus: ‘In […] The Playboy of the Western World the son is an adolescent exhibitionist who boasts of having murdered his father. Then along comes the old man and turns the young conqueror of paternal authority into a figure of fun’ (CK 69). Although fair enough as far as it goes, this synopsis fails to take account of the final twist in the plot. The play in fact ends with the son asserting himself as ‘the master of all fights’. Driving his befuddled father onward, the young fellow departs the stage ‘like a gallant captain with his heathen slave’. J.M. Synge, The Playboy of the Western World and Riders to the Sea (New York, 1993) p. 57.
Ibid., p. 34.
Ibid., p. 21.
Ibid., p. 33.
Ibid., p. 27.
Ibid., p. 23.
A modified version of this passage appeared under the title ‘Bachelor’s Ill Luck’ (Das Unglück des Junggesellen) in Kafka’s collection Meditation (Betrachtung. Leipzig: Rowohlt Verlag, 1913). See CSS 394–5. The author offers a more elaborate treatment of the same theme in `Blumfeld, an Elderly Bachelor’.
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© 1999 Raymond Armstrong
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Armstrong, R. (1999). Return to a Father: The Homecoming . In: Kafka and Pinter Shadow-Boxing. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230376182_2
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