Περίληψη:
In his essays and speeches, Harold Pinter addressed issues that are
central in political and philosophical debates: national identity and
the other, the ethics of responsibility, the relational nature of human
rights, the politics of death. Discussing his treatment of these issues,
Maria Germanou sees Pinter as a Foucauldian intellectual engaged in the
politics of truth, and argues that in these texts the postmodern writer
enables the political activist. Pinter subjects to scrutiny naturalized
political rhetoric, discloses the affinity between meaning and power,
and challenges the legitimacy of established hierarchies and their
practices. His ultimate purpose is to restore ethics to politics. To
this end, he places responsibility for the other at the core of his
problematic in ways similar to Emmanuel Levinas, and invites western
democracies to redefine ‘humanity’ and the ‘international’ community by
taking into consideration accountability for those allowed to die in the
name of an alleged justice. Maria Germanou is Professor in English Drama
at the University of Athens. She has published in Modern Drama,
Comparative Drama, Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik, Gramma, and
elsewhere. Since 2008 she has been co-editor of Synthesis, an e-journal
of comparative literature.
