Collected Poems and Prose

by Harold Pinter

An essential collection for any admirer of Harold Pinter, this brand-new, updated edition of his own selection of his poems and prose includes three never-before-published pieces, the most recent of which he wrote in January 1995. Included are love poems, political diatribes, short stories, character portraits. Some are intimately connected with plays; others are intriguingly allusive, and all of them share Pinter’s lean, taut, and sometimes jarringly original use of language. Katherine Burkman has said that “like Shakespeare, Pinter is a poet,” and in this single volume we see that Harold Pinter is not only, as Irving Wardle has written in the London Times , “our best living playwright” but one of the most accomplished writers in the English language today.

Genres: Poetry

124 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 1986

About the author

Harold Pinter was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramatists with a writing career that spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party (1957), The Homecoming (1964) and Betrayal (1978), each of which he adapted for the screen. His screenplay adaptations of others' works include The Servant (1963), The Go-Between (1971), The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981), The Trial (1993) and Sleuth (2007). He also directed or acted in radio, stage, television and film productions of his own and others' works.

Reviews

[Steven Godin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have thrown a handful of petals on your breasts.
Scarred by this daylight you lie petalstruck.
So your skin imitates the flush, your head
Turning all ways, bearing a havoc of flowers over you.

Now I bring you from dark into daytime,
Laying petal on petal.


This book features 39 poems and 10 short prose pieces from the renowned English playwright spanning a period of about 40 years, with the first piece of prose, Kullus being written when Pinter was only nineteen. There are some links to his plays here, including the short story Tea Party and the poem A view of the Party, as well as a few love poems. Much preferred the poems to be honest, although it was interesing to see the development of his prose writing through the years. He certainly had a way with words and images, and rightly belongs with the other English literary greats of the 20th century.

Would have nudged towards four stars, but there are a couple of pieces here on cricket - and I have zero interest in cricket. So 3/5 it is.

[Teragon Bearyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the poetry I really enjoyed. The prose not so much. My favorite in the book was “American Football”

[Sparrow .]

This singular book presents pieces that are not exactly poetry, fiction, doodles, essays, or anything else I’ve ever read. They are quite successful, and never seem FINISHED:

The obese stars
Dumb stones dumb lumps of light

Before the gasp before they

Before they gasp
And spit out their last blood

[From “Before They Fall”, 1983]

[Derek Emerson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pinter won the Nobel prize for literature, but likely the focus was on his plays. This collection of poems and prose is good, but uneven. The poetry is stronger than the prose, which is experimental and now alsys successful.

[Colin Bruce Anthes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pinter's early poems are good, but his later poems are phenomenal. Amongst his prose, the anecdotal "Mac" about the actor-manager Anew McMaster is funny, deeply felt, and unforgettable.

[Jason · Rating 3 out of 5]

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