Читать онлайн «Harold Pinter: Plays: 4»

Introduction

Harold Pinter’s speech of thanks on receiving the David Cohen British Literature Prize for 1995. The Prize is awarded every two years in recognition of a lifetime’s achievement by a living British writer.

This is a great honour. Thank you very much.

I can’t say that there was a very strong literary tradition in my family. My mother enjoyed reading the novels of A. J.

However, when I first had a poem published in a magazine called Poetry London my parents were quite pleased. I published the poem with my name spelt PINTA, as one of my aunts was convinced that we came from a distinguished Portuguese family, the Da Pintas. This has never been confirmed, nor do I know whether such a family ever existed. The whole thing seemed to be in quite violent conflict with my understanding that all four of my grandparents came from Odessa, or at least Hungary or perhaps even Poland.

There was tentative speculation that PINTA became PINTER in the course of flight from the Spanish Inquisition but whether they had a Spanish Inquisition in Portugal no one quite seemed to know, at least in Hackney, where we lived. Anyway I found the PINTA spelling quite attractive, although I didn’t go as far as the ‘DA’. And I dropped the whole idea shortly afterwards.

There was only one member of my family who appeared to be at all well-off, my great-uncle, Uncle Coleman, who was ‘in business’. He always wore felt carpet-slippers and a skull cap at home and was a very courteous man. My father proposed that I show Uncle Coleman my poem in Poetry London when we next went to tea. I agreed, with some misgivings. My poem was called ‘New Year in the Midlands’ and was to do with a young actor’s vagabond life in rep. It was heavily influenced by Dylan Thomas. It contained the following lines: