The Determinism of Linguistic Disparity of the Social Status of the Protagonists in the Dumb Waiter by Harold Pinter: Stylistic Study
Abstract
This paper tackles The Dumb Waiter written by the playwright Harold Pinter in 1957. The play is about two men “Ben and Gus” who are waiting for an order from their unknown boss, in a basement room in a hotel. The mysterious order is confirmed through a dumb waiter, moreover the plot turns to be a catalyst for tension, and consequently the characters’ existential uncertainties and strained interactions portray intuitively the absurd waiting for the nothingness. This study examines, through Jonathan Culpeper’s (1996) im/politeness theory and Mick Short’s (1996) list of powerful and powerless speech style, the linguistic interactions between the two characters, Ben and Gus. With the help of the determinism, this study aims to expose the notion of absurdity or waiting for the nothingness in the play through disparity in power of speech of the two main characters. Therefore, the main point of this study is to clarify the question of the deterministic reasons of the absurd ending of the play The Dumb Waiter through the above mentioned theories. Thus, this paper will provide a realistic understanding of the linguistic interactions of the two characters in order to simulate and trace the realistic mirrors of the absurd theatre.
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