Dumb Waiter

Ben's personality and class consciousness

Ben's language denotes other parts of his personality, especially his shame over his lower class. He feigns understanding the names of the orders for exotic dishes sent down via the dumb waiter (where upstairs, presumably, someone of higher standing, physically and socially, presides). When they run out of food in the basement, he tells Gus (who yells up the hatch) to observe decorum, then strains to make a formal apology. He is also immensely pleased when the person upstairs uses Ben's phrase "Light the kettle." Like Gus, Ben is a slave to the organization (one with several "departments"), but he does not have the same class-consciousness as Gus; his partner is more aware of their unfortunate lot in life, while Ben considers themselves "fortunate" and diverts himself with hobbies. He also accepts whatever Wilson tells him to do, making him as much a manipulated mute carrier of actions as Gus is to Ben—a human "dumb waiter."

His betrayal of Gus at Wilson's behest is an unsettling reminder of what workers will do to gain the acceptance of their superiors.

Wilson - Wilson is a mysterious figure, the boss of Gus and Ben. He never shows up but the messages from the dumb waiter may be from him. He may also own the café in which the play is set. Regardless of his physical reality or lack thereof, he plays an important role in the other characters' minds.

Wilson never appears in the play, but he is directly or indirectly behind the messages from the dumb waiter and speaking tube. His obvious theatrical corollary is Godot in Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Both are off-stage characters who exercise a powerful, god-like influence over the on-stage characters. When Gus suggests that Wilson is playing "games" with the men (the orders for food), it raises the possibility of Wilson's having a sadistic personality—a malevolent god. Not only is he going to execute Gus, for unknown reasons,

but he will put him through an agonizing final day. Gus also mentions that Wilson put them through tests several years ago to prove themselves, so we know that Wilson may also be paranoid (a reasonable expectation for the head of a crime syndicate).

Themes

The Silence and Violence of Language

Pinter's work is heavily influenced by Samuel Beckett, who used silence-filled pauses for a revolutionary theatrical effect. Pinter has spoken of speech as a stratagem designed to cover the nakedness of silence, and these aims are often evident in the dialogue of Gus and Ben. Ben's most prominent response to Gus's constant questions about the nature of their jobs is silence. Lurking underneath this silence is always the threat of violence, the anticipation of something deathly—the play ends as Ben trains his gun on Gus in silence.

Gus's questions and lamentations are also deflected, delayed, or interrupted. Ben frequently changes the conversation and never replies with

any emotional depth to Gus's more probing questions. In the same way, they both avoid discussing with any profundity the newspaper articles about death, skipping past them to more trivial matters, such as the malfunctioning toilet. Ben sometimes delays his response until they are interrupted—by the sound of an inanimate object, such as the toilet (which flushes on a delay) and the dumb waiter.

The language itself is also tinged with violence, especially when the topic is something seemingly trivial. The men's argument over the phrase "Light the kettle" is filled with Ben's barbs that intimidate and shame Gus. Moreover, when Ben screams "THE KETTLE, YOU FOOL!" and chokes Gus, one gets the feeling that his words are intertwined with the act of physical violence.

In a sense, the looming presence of Wilson is the most dominating silence in the play. Assuming Wilson is the one sending the men messages through the dumb waiter and the speaking tube (and Gus

does say at one point that sometimes Wilson only sends messages), then the audience never gets a chance to hear him, but only hears him through a secondary mouthpiece as the men read or repeat his orders. His mysteriousness is one of the more sinister components of the play, for Wilson seems to be everywhere through his multi-tiered organization. He performs an off-stage role similar to that of Godot in Beckett's Waiting for Godot, but whereas Godot symbolizes a neutral god-like figure for whom the characters wait, Wilson is a malevolent god whom the characters wait for in violent silence.

Anxiety Over Social Class

Gus and Ben are both lower-class criminals, and most productions of the play emphasize their social status with appropriate dialects and accents. Some productions may even opt to give Ben a slightly higher-ranking accent, as he is more concerned with his standing. He repeatedly admonishes Gus for his "slack" appearance and habits, urging him to make himself more presentable.

But Ben also seems more resigned to his lowly criminal life; he considers them fortunate for having jobs. His profound shame over his class emerges in interactions with those upstairs via the dumbwaiter, and much of this shame is tied to language. The food orders from the dumb waiter are for increasingly exotic foods with unfamiliar names, and Ben pretends to know how to make them only to a point. When they decide to send up their cache of food, even Gus feels he has to impress those upstairs by announcing the brand names of their pedestrian foodstuffs. Ben also happily reports that the man upstairs, presumably of higher social standing, uses the same debated phrase—"Light the kettle"—as he does, and he warns Gus to observe decorum when talking to the upstairs, as he demonstrates with his formal apology. Ben is far more reverent of Wilson than the inquiring Gus, and his deference is attributed less to feelings of respect than to an overriding inferiority complex;

Wilson is their leader for a reason, and he must obey him at all costs, even if it means betraying his friend. In this light, The Dumb Waiter can be read as an anti-corporate update of Beckett's Waiting for Godot, an allegory of in-fighting and what corporate workers will do to please their superiors.

Motifs

Repetition

At the play's start and end, Ben expresses outrage at an article in the newspaper while Gus sympathizes. Similar repetitions mark the action throughout the play. Early on, Gus bemoans the dull sleep-and-work routine of his life, and various repetitive actions—from Gus's tendency to run out matches to his recurring trips to the bathroom—emerge as the basis of this cyclical fatigue. Language, however, is where Pinter's use of repetition points to violence and the nearness of death. Gus almost always has to repeat and rephrase his important questions to Ben, questions that touch upon darker issues Ben does not wish to reveal. Ben's mechanical

Le istruzioni per eseguire il loro omicidio vengono ripetute da Gus con una simile distacco, e quando Ben ripete attraverso il tubo parlante la sua stessa missione di uccidere Gus, lo fa in modo simile all'interazione precedente con Gus. Pinter ha paragonato gli echi al silenzio, e se si considerano i silenzi nelle sue opere come indicazioni di violenza, allora gli echi linguistici e le azioni ripetitive suggeriscono anche la violenza.

Simboli

Il dumb waiter

Il dumb waiter serve come simbolo della comunicazione interrotta e unilaterale tra Gus e Ben. Se i messaggi devono essere inviati tramite il dumb waiter, allora solo una persona alla volta può inviarli e non si può parlare e ascoltare contemporaneamente attraverso il tubo parlante del dumb waiter. Di conseguenza, Gus e Ben non hanno mai un dialogo completamente aperto, che viene ulteriormente minimizzato dalla conoscenza di Ben del suo imminente tradimento di Gus, e ogni volta che Gus cerca di affrontare qualcosa di emotivo, Ben rifiuta di parlare con lui. Questa disconnessione è l'essenza della loro relazione.

They do not speak with, but to each other. They are like the dumb waiter—mute carriers of information, not sharers of it. Moreover, Ben, especially, is manipulated by Wilson in the same way that the dumb waiter is controlled by its system of pulleys. Part One: Beginning Until The Envelope Summary The setting is a basement with two beds, a serving hatch, a kitchen and bathroom to the left, and another passage to the right. In silence, Ben reads a newspaper on his bed while Gus ties his shoelaces on his bed. Gus finishes and walks to the kitchen door, then stops and shakes his foot. Ben watches as Gus takes a flattened matchbox out of his shoe. After he and Ben exchange a glance, Gus puts it in his pocket. From his other shoe, he takes out a flattened cigarette carton. They exchange another look, and Gus puts the carton in his pocket before he leaves for the bathroom. There's a sound of the toilet chain being pulled without it flushing, and Gus returns. Ben angrily relates to Gus a

Newspaper article, which reports on an elderly man who tried to cross a busy street by crawling under a truck, which then ran over him. Gus agrees that it is abominable.

Gus again tries to flush the toilet, but it doesn't work. When he returns, Ben orders him to make tea. Gus admires the dishware. He asks Ben for a cigarette, and hopes, "it won't be a long job." He remembers he wanted to ask Ben something, but is interrupted by Ben who reports on an article about a child killing a cat. Gus then asks if Ben has noticed how long it takes for the toilet tank to fill. Ben suggests that it is a "deficient ballcock."

Gus complains that he didn't sleep well on the bed and then sees a picture on the wall of cricket players entitled "The First Eleven." Neither he nor Ben knows that the "first eleven" refers to a school's top cricket players. He wishes for a window in the room and laments that his life revolves around entering a dark room.

he doesn't have time for that. He reminds Gus that they have a job to do tomorrow and they need to focus on that. Gus reluctantly agrees and starts making the tea. As they sit in silence, Gus starts to feel restless. He looks around the basement and notices the damp walls and the old furniture. He comments on how depressing the place is, but Ben brushes it off and tells him to stop complaining. Gus takes a sip of his tea and asks Ben why they stopped in the middle of the road that morning. Ben explains that they were early for their job and had some time to spare. Gus then asks if they were too early to move into their new place, which would explain why everything seemed dirty to him. Gus realizes that he has forgotten which town they are in. Ben tells him that they are in Birmingham, an industrial city and the second-largest city in Great Britain. Gus mentions that he wants to watch the Birmingham soccer team play tomorrow, but Ben dismisses the idea, saying they have more important things to do. And so, they continue their day in the basement, with Gus feeling a sense of emptiness and longing for something more.

that there is no time and that they have to get back, even though they used to stay over after a job. Gus speaks about a Birmingham gam