Product Description

When Teddy, a professor in an American university, brings his wife Ruth to visit London and his family, he finds himself prey to old conflicts. But now it is Ruth who becomes the focus of the family's struggle for supremacy. The playwright's other works include "The Birthday Party" and "Old Times".

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #50676 in Books
• Published on: 1991-01-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 88 pages

Customer Reviews

Pinter: Literature's Greatest Hero
Harold Pinter's masterpiece, 'The Homecoming', is a triumph of intertextuality that resonates deeply with every single instinct and emotion that fuels my fervor for reading. Pinter's genius is unsurpassed. As a feminist, I've never encountered a more perfect manifestation of female superiority since I first heard Bon Jovi. Ruth's struggle, and ultimately her self actualisation and 'homecoming', is almost remeniscent of Simba's recapturing of the Pride Lands in 'The Lion King'. I look forward to reading more Pinter plays en route to Belgium during my next debating speech.

Home is where the heart is
5 stars going on 10. It will take me weeks to digest this one. Little bit of a surprise, eh? So Pinter is not just a political campaigner.

The quality of the dialogue knocked me off my feet. Conventions seem well-established but aren't quite the expected conventions. The family is close but not quite the expected closeness. This is hardly a dysfunctional family: it's just a family not functioning as you might have been taught a family should.

I recently watched the 1973 American Film Theatre performance of this play on VHS. Vivian Merchant, who also starred in the American Film Theatre's version of Jean Genet's "The Maids", plays Ruth in "The Homecoming". How to expect a better cast? In the hands of those incredible actors, this play slammed into me. It will take me days to find suitable words to describe what hit me. Unlike the plays of Pinter's friend Beckett, "The Homecoming" can't be dismissed as Theatre of the Absurd. Not that there isn't absurdity, but that Pinter works hard to interwine it with familiar daily routines.

No boring moments. At the beginning the hostilities seemeed contrived but very soon a lot more was going on. Most of us aren't as creative as this family in finding a way to make the family work ... and most of us probably wouldn't want to be. But they are close and not just because of what they share during this visit. The father especially struck me as rising above his angers to find a love (however unconventional) for his sons and that warmth became unmistakeable as the play progressed. No? Well, something special is going on in "The Homecoming" and I'll probably need many passes to understand what it is. But, with such rich dialogue, many passes seem warranted.

DARK COMEDY OF MENACE EXPLORING FAMILIAL HOSTILITY
The Homecoming is a dark and complexing play which explores the underlying tensions within a family. The action takes place in a house in London: A Professor of Philosophy returns home with his wife to see the family, comprising of Max, a former butcher and the savage patriarch of the family, his brother, Sam, and his two sons, Lenny and Joey. What ensues is a power struggle, focussed on Teddy's (the professor's) wife, between the various members of the family. The outcome is shocking and in many ways inexplicable. However this should not detract anything from the enigmatic brilliance of The Homecoming. Definitely worth reading, but prepared to be shocked!