Violence In Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming

The Homecoming is one of the most important early works of the famous British dramatist Harold Pinter.In this play,Pinter concentrates the dramatic conflict in an iconic limited space,displaying a couple’s unusual homecoming experience.This thesis focuses on various forms of violence between the characters in this play.Based on the operating mechanism of violence,the thesis analyzes Pinter’s dramatic deployment of violence in family structure,in order to explore the psychological state of the characters and the social dilemma they confront revealed by the effects of violence.According to the degree of invisibility of violence,three categories of violence,namely direct violence,indirect violence and normalized violence will be discussed separately.The thesis is composed of five parts.The introduction includes the overview of The Homecoming,the topic statement,the literature review,the definition of key concept,and the thesis outline.The first chapter explores the direct forms of violence in the play.Characters inflict subjective physical violence or its threats to deal with the crisis of power they face.In addition,narration of past violent acts is used as a means of oppressing others and seizing power.Chapter Two analyzes indirect forms of violence mainly manifested in language.The use of verbal violence stems from fear of gender or class.Chapter Three deals with the extremely hidden normalized violence.Normalized violence is often invisible in everyday life and hard to perceive.Since the characters’ resistance to structural violence is difficult to reach the root of the social system,it is usually futile.The conclusion of this thesis points out that through the presentation of different forms of violent scenes,The Homecoming reflects the living conditions of human beings in the tense social environment of post-war British society.Although people try to gain or maintain their power by perpetrating violence,they ultimately fail to resist or even become aware of the violence rooted in the social system.The object of their rebellion is not the social system,but the violence itself or the symbolization of objective violence.Pinter’s use of violence as a theatrical device reveals the confused psychological state of people in post-war British society and their urgent need to seek self-subjectivity,in the meantime indicating the violent nature of social and political system.