Silence as Existential Void and Psychological Warfare: A Comparative Study of the Dramatic Pause in Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and Pinter’s The Homecoming

Abstract

This paper presents the importance of silence as an effective means of expressiveness in 20th -century drama with references to Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter as the innovators of the Theatre of the Absurd. The main aim is to make a comparative study of aesthetics and role of silence in Waiting for Godot by Beckett and Homecoming by Pinter. Based on theoretical models of theatrical semiotics (especially Martin Esslin), the Theatre of the Absurd (which appeals to Camus and Sartre), and existentialist philosophy (which would be familiar to them), the paper analyzes the usage of communicative voids by both playwrights. This is important because it shows that the dramaturgies of silence used are different: the silence of Beckett is used to articulate metaphysical absurdity, inadequacy of language, solitude of existence, and addresses the silent universe, whereas the silence of Pinter is used to address the aspects of power relations and interpersonal conflict and ambiguity in a tactical pause and subtext. The findings demonstrate that the silence of Beckett is metaphysical and that of Pinter is psychological warfare and social criticism. Both change the lack of presence into deep existential utterance, accentuating various aspects of the contemporary human condition, one of the cosmic, one the social, adding to the comprehension of silence as a multi-purpose dramatic agency.