HAROLD PINTER The Collection

Contemporary play in prose which was first presented on TV by Associated Rediffusion Television, London, on 11 May, 1961. On stage it was first presented on 18 June 1962. It has just one act.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

JAMES: He is a man in his thirties who lives in a flat in Chelsea. He lives with his wife Stella. He is extremely jealous and not very mentally equilibrated.

STELLA: She is a woman in her thirties who lives in Leeds with James. She works in a boutique where she sells clothes and usually goes to fashion events, such as the Collection presentation in Leeds.

BILL: He is a man in his twenties who is somehow in the fashion bussiness as well. He lives with his companion Harry in a house in Belgravia.

HARRY: He is a man in his forties who lives with Bill. It is quite likely that they are homosexual as he feels a kind of jealousy of James, at first. He manages through the story always keeping calm and coherent as though he knew what to do always.

PLOT: A man called James goes to Bill’s house. He insists he needs to have a word with him. He speaks to Bill and tells him he is the husband of the woman with whom he had an affair the week before in Leeds. Bill seems to be astonished at this and he lets on he does not know what James is talking about.

Harry, Bill’s companion, is upset about the visits which James pay them now and again. Therefore, he goes to talk to James’s wife, Stella. She tells him the story has all been invented by her husband. Nevertheless, she has been talking to his husband about it. They have a long chat and Harry goes back home where James and Bill are. He just tells James that Stella told him it has all been made up by her. Then James is relieved that nothing really happened and is intending to go home when Bill confesses him that, actually they met in Leeds but they never touched, they just talk about it. James goes home and asks his wife about it. She does not answer.

SPACE: There are differents spaces in which the play is developed. For example the house of Bill and Harry (Belgravia) and the Stella’s and James’ one ( Chelsea). The play is represented in closed places.

TIME: The play is placed on autumn. It describes what happened during some days. The play follows a rythm and it does not show any incongruity in relation with time.

LITERARY RESOURCES: The play is written in a really simple language which made it easy to understand. It is written in prose with colloqualisms.

PERSONAL OPINION: It is an interesting play which accords with Pinter’s style. It is about a very common topic which could be the jealousy and the absurdness of our feelings and actions, sometimes. James feels really angry with the man who is supposed to have had an affair with his wife. He then goes to talk with him. What for? Is what anyone (or at least myself) would think. Then he finds out it is all an invention of his wife and feels relieved and calm and apologises for all bother to the other pair. The affair could have taken place, or maybe not. There is not evidence of either one thing or the other. The characters seem to be telling now the truth and then lying. It could have be a stratagem from Stella to prove her husband’s love or to enforce their relationship. It also could have all been an invention of James and all the others are just following him in order not to angry him and finish with it as soon as they can. As always when talking about Pinter’s plays, they are open to personal interpretation and full of little details which are not exactly included in the text but in the personal reflexion which everyone does after having read them. There should be considered the role of lies. Therefore, one can never know who is telling the truth. Another important topic is memory: All the characters are discussing about past things and remembering past scenes which are never represented, as though the main plot had happened somewhere else.