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Harold Pinter awarded the 2005 Nobel Literature Prize
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Mats Wiman
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The Nobel Prize laureate for literature 2005: Oct 13, 2005

NEWS FLASH!
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2005

The Nobel Prize in Literature goes to Harold Pinter "who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed rooms".

Please comment.

Mats J C Wiman
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NEWS FLASH!
The Nobel Prize in Literature 2005

The Nobel Prize in Literature goes to Harold Pinter "who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed rooms".

Please comment.

Mats J C Wiman
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Aurora Humarán (X)
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Harold Pinter Oct 13, 2005



I can make no comments as I have never read him.

Thanks for the 'scoop', Mats!

Au


 
Roomy Naqvy
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very interesting Oct 13, 2005

I have taught Harold Pinter's The Homecoming ... and he is certainly a very difficult writer to slot and to teach. Last week, one of my students went on to say, "Sir, doesn't he suffer from psychological problems to write thus?"

But he is a very interesting choice.

Roomy


 
Roomy Naqvy
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The Homecoming and Harold Pinter Oct 13, 2005

Harold Pinter's The Homecoming is a particularly savage play. Teddy returns to his North London 'home' after six years. He is a professor at a American University where he teaches Philosophy. His father is Max, a retired butcher. Brothers are Lenny, a pimp, and Joey, who works for a demolition team during the day, while he trains to be a professional boxer in the evenings.

He returns home with Ruth, his wife. He has three kids with her. He returns late at night, unannounced. He ope
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Harold Pinter's The Homecoming is a particularly savage play. Teddy returns to his North London 'home' after six years. He is a professor at a American University where he teaches Philosophy. His father is Max, a retired butcher. Brothers are Lenny, a pimp, and Joey, who works for a demolition team during the day, while he trains to be a professional boxer in the evenings.

He returns home with Ruth, his wife. He has three kids with her. He returns late at night, unannounced. He opens the main door with his key. He goes to look at his room while Lenny meets Ruth. There is a kind of power struggle between them, with Lenny trying to prevail. There is also dialogue with sexual innuendos.

Next morning, Max shouts at Teddy stating that he got a whore in the house. Teddy explains and then she is accepted. But soon, Joey wants to have sex with her. He is 'up two hours with her but cannot go the whole hog'. Max and Lenny make plans to keep her in the house. Teddy tells Max he would like to return home with her. Max and Lenny also discuss that she would have to earn some money. [By whoring, of course. 'Only few hours a day after which she'll stay with us'.]

When Ruth comes, Teddy says that his family has invited her to stay longer and that she'll have to do something to earn a bit. Then Lenny and Ruth discuss...she wants a flat with three rooms. Lenny wants to give a two room flat etc.

Teddy has to return alone. Ruth stays on. Joey does not want to share her with anyone else. The Two Act play ends with Max asking Ruth for a kiss.

A disturbing play. A play that is savage and that deals with the possibilities of power as an element of human existence. A play that is difficult to slot. Not like the traditional Theatre of the Absurd.

Martin Esslin, the well known critic, quotes a letter Pinter received after his play, _The Birthday Party_ opened, in his book, _Pinter the Playwright_::-->

================
"Dear Sir, I would be obliged if you would kindly explain to me the meaning of your play The Birthday Party. These are the points I do not understand: 1. Who are the two men? 2. Where did Stanley come from? 3. Were they all supposed to be normal? You will appreciate that without the answers to my questions I cannot fully understand your play."

Pinter is said to have replied: "Dear Madam, I would be obliged if you would kindly explain to me the meaning of your letter. These are the points which I do not understand: 1. Who are you? 2. Where do you come from? 3. Are you supposed to be normal? You will appreciate that without the answers to my questions I cannot fully understand your letter."
================

A very interesting Nobel Laureate. I hope Mr. Pinter reads this...one of my friends who teaches at a College 200 km away did his doctorate on Pinter and he says that Pinter has been very political in his latest plays and he has criticized the unipolar hegemony of the world today.

Roomy Naqvy
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Aurora Humarán (X)
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An interesting man, yes... Oct 13, 2005

Roomy Naqvy wrote:

A very interesting Nobel Laureate. I hope Mr. Pinter reads this...one of my friends who teaches at a College 200 km away did his doctorate on Pinter and he says that Pinter has been very political in his latest plays and he has criticized the unipolar hegemony of the world today.

Roomy Naqvy



Then this book you mention will be the first one after Miller's Sexus...already in the waiting list.

He does seem to be an interesting writer.

Au


 
Roomy Naqvy
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Please re-rate Asturias Oct 13, 2005

Marcus Malabad wrote:

And some winners just fade into oblivion just as quickly as their stars rise when they're given the money and medal and their hand shaken by the King of Sweden: Agnon, Sachs, Kawabata, Asturias, Martinson, Montale, Undset, Bergson, etc.


Dear Marcus,

Now that Pinter has got it, I think I can come out in my defence of Asturias. I seriously think that Miguel Angel Asturias of Guatemala was a writer who has only been hurt due to lack of publicity. I have seen Marquez, Esquivel, Llosa, Fuentes [with some difficulty]...easily in bookstores in India. It is difficult to find Cortazar in bookshops here. And it is next to impossible to find Carpentier. And yes, impossible to find Asturias...Also impossible to find Cabrera Infante.

Pankaj Mishra**, I believe he was with HarperCollins, once wrote an article on Garcia Marquez for the Indian Review of Books [now out of print and the article was published quite some years ago] where he said that Marquez was a writer of 'kitsch'. I found it very disturbing those days, when I had newly read Of Love and Other Demons. But as I read more in life, I realized that Mishra might have been right. Marquez, quite like R K Narayan, writes the same novel, more or less, except that he is very very well versed with his craft and gets lovely publicity.

**Pankaj Mishra::-> http://www.lettre-ulysses-award.org/jury04/bio_mishra.html
http://www.nybooks.com/authors/196
[Mishra was credited with discovering Arundhati Roy's God of Small Things]

Asturias lacked that publicity.

Books like The Politics of Postmodernism rate The President by Asturias very highly.

Actually, The President is of the same class like Orwell's 1984. You cannot find another novel in the world like The President which will give such a scathing description of totalitarian rule and which will outline the suffocating grip of power on human lives.

Please re-rate Asturias. I also believe he has done excellent work on Mayan legends.

Aurora, would you like to defend Asturias?

Roomy

[Edited at 2005-10-13 18:15]

[Edited at 2005-10-13 18:17]

[Edited at 2005-10-13 19:57]


 
Aurora Humarán (X)
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A magical writer Oct 13, 2005

Roomy Naqvy wrote:

Aurora, would you like to defend Asturias?

Roomy



Any doubts, Roomy?

It's a pity you cannot get Cabrera Infante's works in India. What about Macedonio Fernandez's works? You would LOVE him.

Au


Underlined in my own book:

«En Antigua, la segunda ciudad de los Conquistadores, de horizonte limpio y viejo vestido colonial, el espiritu religioso entristece el paisaje. En esta ciudad de iglesias se siente una gran necesidad de pecar. Alguna puerta se abre dando paso al señor obispo, que viene seguido del señor alcalde. Se habla a media voz. Se ve con los párpados caídos. La visión de la vida a través de los ojos entreabiertos es clásica en las ciudades conventuales. Calles de huertos. Arquerias. Patios solariegos donde hacen labor las fuentes claras. Grave metal de las campanas. ¡Ojalá se conserve esta ciudad antigua bajo la cruz católica y la guarda fiel de sus volcanes! Luego, fiestas reales celebradas en geniales días, y festivas pompas. Las señoras, en sillas de altos espaldares, se dejan saludar por caballeros de bigote petulante y traje de negro y plata. Ésta une al pie breve la mirada languida. Aquélla tiene los cabellos de seda. Un perfume desmaya el aliento de la que ahora conversa con un señor de la Audiencia. La noche penetra ... penetra ... El obispo se retira, seguido de los bedeles. El tesorero, gentil hombre y caballero de la orden de Montesa, relata la historia de los linajes. De los veladores de vidrio cae la luz de las candelas entumecida y eclesiástica. La música es suave, bullente, y la danza triste a compás de tres por cuatro. A intervalos se oye la voz del tesorero que comenta el tratamiento de "Muy ilustre Señor" concedido al conde de la Gomera, capitán general del Reino, y el eco de dos relojes viejos que cuentan el tiempo sin equivocarse. La noche penetra ... penetra ... El Cuco de los Sueños va hilando los cuentos.»

Guatemala, Miguel Ángel Asturias


 
Marcus Malabad
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on Asturias, Pinter, Rushdie and others Oct 14, 2005

Hi Roomy,

My comment above was not meant as criticism of the literary works of the authors I mentioned although, admittedly, it did seem as if I were saying these authors did not deserve the Nobel prize. I actually have not read any of them so I'm in no position to give an opinion, one way or another. As I said, I tend to read (or, more precisely, have time to read) only those authors who write in languages I understand. That means I'd rather read Bunin or Pasternak (had to at Uni)
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Hi Roomy,

My comment above was not meant as criticism of the literary works of the authors I mentioned although, admittedly, it did seem as if I were saying these authors did not deserve the Nobel prize. I actually have not read any of them so I'm in no position to give an opinion, one way or another. As I said, I tend to read (or, more precisely, have time to read) only those authors who write in languages I understand. That means I'd rather read Bunin or Pasternak (had to at Uni) than, say, Bergson or Agnon (who the heck were they?).

It's probably reasonable to suspect that the selection committee was and is motivated not solely by the literary merits of some of the past choices. Solzhenitsyn, for all the significance of the struggle that he represented, is a tremendous slog to wade through, what with his detail-infused, dry, journalistic style. The same goes for Sholokhov (a must-read in my 3rd year at the Uni of Moscow; I resisted). Same for Milosz and Wole Soyinka. Meritorious, surely; political, likely.

Some choices too were probably borne by the laudable desire to introduce unknown literatures to the world (sadly through translation): KERTÉSZ, GAO XINGJIAN, SZYMBORSKA, OE, MahFOUZ, to mention only the more recent ones. I've actually read some of Szymborska's poetry in both PL and EN and Oe in an excellent En translation. But translation is just another monster to plod through.

Harold Pinter I know only through his The Homecoming and several of his screenplays: The French Lieutenant's Woman and The Betrayal. He's had a very hard year this guy: marriages, cancer, protests, left-wing politics. You can hardly ignore the fact that awarding a prize that will bring worldwide attention to a man who has expressed vehemently opposing opinions against the US and UK administrations is, maybe slightly, ok more than likely, politically-motivated. Surely a very admirable playwright in his own terms: The Homecoming reminds me of the stuffy and stagnant impotence in Tennessee Williams (cf. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof). But one wonders...

...BUT if I were to choose a playwright, I'd go for Tom Stoppard. This man is a master of language: Guildenstern and Rosencrantz are Dead; Arcadia; Indian Ink; The Real Inspector Hound; The Real Thing; plus his film work of course - Sheakespeare in Love (Oscar), Empire of the Sun, Brazil. He's even rumored to have penned the screenplay for the much-awaited Dark Materials trilogy written by Philip Pullman (I wait with bated breath).

Naipul started it in 2001 and I think the coming years will see the rise of Anglo/Indian literature (if it hasn't reached its pinnacle already in terms of book sales). There is now more literary talent coming from South Asia (or those of South Asian descent and living in the West like Ondaatje) than from her former colonial master. To wit: Roy, Desai, Mistry, Chatterjee, Ghosh, Sealy, Narayan, Jhabvala.

No to mention the stupendously talented Rushdie, of course, who's a frequent visitor to Canada (he lives in NYC). Anecdote: Was dining about 8 years ago in NYC in a posh restaurant called Balthazar. As we were slurping through our oysters, there he was, sitting at the table in front, with a hot blond. I had just read Midnight's Children (and Satanic Verses a year before) so was really excited to see the man in person. "Should I interrupt his hush-hush dialog with the blond?", "Would it be too much like a gushy fan to stick a napkin in his nose and 'please signature please'?" I ended up just making furtive glances, trying to eavesdrop and observe what they were eating: he - fish; she - chicken. They shared desert. Nothing much was said between them. The blond didn't seem the literary type.

Anyway, he was here recently in Toronto to read excerpts from his latest "Shalimar the Clown". Was sold out before I even left the house. Will reserve the December holidays to read the book. (by the way, haven't actually finished his The Ground Beneath Her Feet, which I'm finding is way inferior to the two above and even The Moor's Last Sigh). All this said, he remains, with Eco, the only writer for whom I would actually rush to the bookstore when word is out that a new book has been published.

Hey, committee members, give him the darn prize next year!

[Edited at 2005-10-14 14:17]
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Aurora Humarán (X)
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A bit of Asturias into English Oct 14, 2005


En esta ciudad de iglesias se siente una gran necesidad de pecar.



In this city of churches, one feels a strong need to sin.

In this city of churches, you get a strong urge to sin.


My friend Dan Newland's translations.


 
Aurora Humarán (X)
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Please... Oct 14, 2005

Marcus Malabad wrote:

Hey, committee members, give him the darn prize next year!




Ditto!


 
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Harold Pinter awarded the 2005 Nobel Literature Prize







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