184 Quotes by Harold Pinter

Don’t forget the earth’s about five thousand million years old, at least. Who can afford to live in the past?

The Companion of Honour I regarded as an award from the country for 50 years of work – which I thought was okay.

All that happens is that the destruction of human beings – unless they’re Americans – is called collateral damage.

Clinton’s hands remain incredibly clean, don’t they, and Tony Blair’s smile remains as wide as ever. I view these guises with profound contempt.

I don’t intend to simply go away and write my plays and be a good boy. I intend to remain an independent and political intelligence in my own right.

I don’t write with any audience in mind. I just write. I take a chance on the audience. That’s what I did originally, and I think it’s worked – in the sense that I find there is an audience.

Truth in drama is forever elusive. You never quite find it, but the search for it is compulsive. The search is clearly what drives the endeavour. The search is your task.

My first play was 'The Room', written when I was twenty-seven.

My father was a tailor. He worked from seven o'clock in the morning until seven at night. At least when he got home, my mother always cooked him a very good dinner. Lots of potatoes, I remember; he used to knock them down like a dose of salts. He needed it, after a 12-hour day.