Themes, Symbols, Images…

Textual Analysis of The Dumb Waiter

Dumb waiter is a small lift for carrying things, especially food, between the floors of a building.

In The Dumb Waiter, the dumb-waiter symbolizes a disconnection in human communication.

Symbols

Whenever Gus tries to bring up something emotional, Ben refuses to speak with him.

This disconnection is the essence of their relationship.

They do not speak with, but to each other. They are like the dumb waiter—mute carriers of information, not sharers of it.

Locked in an airless and windowless basement room, two hit men await orders from Wilson, their all knowing but never present boss. Gus, haunted by the memory of the last job, knows that something is wrong when their normally faultless routine is interrupted by some mysterious happenings. 

BIRTH the left side > food comes in and goes out

DEATH the rightt

side>exit

The basement room suggests human

existence lived mostly without

understanding but under pressure,

especially

when the orders come down from

above.

Pinter’s LanguagePinter's language, usually

lower-class vernacular (the language or dialect spoken by the ordinary people of a country), has been described as poetic.

His compressed, rhythmic lines rely heavily on subtext and hint at darker meanings.

Pinter has spoken much on the subject, and has categorized speech as that which attempts to cover the nakedness of silence.

Theatre of the Absurd

Theatre of the Absurd is a French dramatic movement in the 1950s.

It is express the belief that human existence has no meaning or purpose and therefore all communication breaks down. 

The Absurd in these plays takes the form of man’s reaction to a world apparently without meaning, and man as a puppet controlled or menaced by invisible outside forces.

As with Godot, there are two characters, one dominant, one submissive.

In Godot, the two men wait around for a man named Godot who never arrives, yet who exercises great power over them.

In The Dumb Waiter, Ben and

Gus are at the back and call of Wilson, a mysterious character who dominates the duo even when he's not around, or perhaps especially when he's not around.

• It is clear that Pinter was heavily influenced by Samuel Beckett.

The similarities between them are obvious. The Dumb Waiter is quite similar to Waiting for Godot.

Whereas Beckett's silences hint at alienation, boredom, and the slow approach to death, Pinter's are ominous and violent. The true natures and motivations of his characters emerge in their silences.