Reading Order
The Caretaker Reading Order
The Caretaker (1960) by Harold Pinter is the play that established his public reputation — the first to run in the West End, the first to be filmed, and the one most readers and theater-goers encounter first. Davies, a homeless man, is brought to a dilapidated room in North London by the gentle and distracted Aston, who offers him lodgings; Aston's brother Mick, who owns the room, intermittently drives Davies out or intimidates him; and the play is organized around Davies's failed attempts to make himself secure — to become the caretaker of the title — and his eventual expulsion. The play is the purest expression of Pinter's formal method: the apparently realistic surface that contains an unspecifiable menace, the characters whose histories and motivations are deliberately obscure, the silences that are more eloquent than the speeches, and the comedy that is inseparable from the cruelty.
Where to start
The Caretaker (1960) — the complete play. Best Pinter reading order: The Birthday Party (1958) → The Caretaker (1960) → The Homecoming (1965) → Old Times (1971) → Betrayal (1978) → One for the Road (1984). The Birthday Party first establishes the menace play; The Caretaker is the most theatrically accessible of the early works
Complete The Caretaker Book List
- 1Buy
The Caretaker
Harold Pinter·1960·The play that established Pinter's reputation — Davies, Aston, and Mick in the North London room. The most theatrically accessible of the early Pinter menace plays, and the one most likely to be staged and filmed - 2Buy
The Birthday Party
Harold Pinter·1958·The earlier companion and the more elaborate early Pinter play — Stanley's interrogation at his birthday party. The Birthday Party and The Caretaker are companion explorations of the same Pinteresque situation (a character in a room, menace from within or without, the impossibility of security) but The Birthday Party is more theatrical and more violent; The Caretaker is more intimate and more comedic - 3Buy
The Homecoming
Harold Pinter·1965·The mature companion — Teddy's return to his North London family with his wife Ruth. The Homecoming is what The Caretaker is reaching toward: the same formal method (menace, silence, the gap between what is said and what is meant) applied with greater confidence and greater opacity. The Homecoming is the most unsettling of Pinter's works and the one that critics have most intensely argued about - 4Buy
Waiting for Godot
Samuel Beckett·1953·The theatrical precursor — Beckett's play organized around waiting, the gap between speech and silence, and the impossibility of escape. The Caretaker is in the tradition of Waiting for Godot: the confined space, the small group of characters in mutual dependency, the comedy that is also despair, the endurance of a situation that cannot be resolved. Pinter acknowledged Beckett as his primary theatrical influence - 5Buy
Of Mice and Men
John Steinbeck·1937·Steinbeck's novella companion in the tradition of the story about the tramp who attaches himself to a household and then is expelled — Lennie and George's dream of their own place, and its destruction. Of Mice and Men and The Caretaker share the same basic situation (the homeless man who is briefly given shelter, who dreams of security, who is expelled) but Steinbeck's treatment is sentimental and Pinter's is unsentimental: the comparison illuminates what each writer chose to do with the same material - 6Buy
The Dumb Waiter
Harold Pinter·1957·The companion one-act — Gus and Ben waiting in a basement room for their assignment. The Dumb Waiter is the most concentrated of the early Pinter menace plays and the best short text for readers who want to understand how Pinter's formal method works before reading The Caretaker - 7Buy
Endgame
Samuel Beckett·1957·Beckett's contemporary companion in the tradition of the confined play about dependency and menace. Endgame and The Caretaker are companion works: both are organized around a small group of characters in an enclosed space, both investigate the relationship between dependency and power, and both refuse to give their situations any meaning beyond what the plays themselves contain - 8Buy
Long Day's Journey into Night
Eugene O'Neill·1956·O'Neill's companion in the tradition of the play about a family confined together in a room, whose relationships of dependency and mutual damage are progressively revealed. Long Day's Journey into Night and The Caretaker are companion investigations of the confined family space as the site of power, dependency, and damage — but where O'Neill's family has an explicit shared history that the play reveals, Pinter's characters have histories that are deliberately obscure
The Caretaker — Frequently Asked Questions
What is The Caretaker by Harold Pinter about?
The Caretaker is about a homeless man named Davies who is offered lodgings in a dilapidated North London room by the gentle and distracted Aston. Aston has clearly suffered some kind of institutional damage (the play's most revealing speech describes what sounds like electroconvulsive therapy), and he offers Davies the possibility of becoming the caretaker of the room while Aston works to sort out his own projects (repairing the room, building a shed). Davies repeatedly fails to accept this offer on the terms in which it is given — he defers his planned journey to Sidcup (where papers are held that will establish his identity), he complains about the cold and the draft and the other residents, and he attempts to negotiate a better position for himself with Aston's brother Mick. The play ends with Aston expelling Davies, and Davies's final speech of bewilderment and appeal ('Look... if I... got down... if I was to... get my papers... would you... would you let... would you...') is the play's most devastating moment. The play is about security and its impossibility, about the gap between what people offer each other and what they can actually give, and about the comedy and cruelty that are inseparable in Pinter's world.
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