“One way of looking at speech is to say that it is a constant stratagem to cover nakedness.”
Writing for the Theatre (1962)
Source: Various Voices: Prose, Poetry, Politics
Context: The speech we hear is an indication of that which we don't hear. It is a necessary avoidance, a violent, sly, and anguished or mocking smoke screen which keeps the other in its true place. When true silence falls we are left with echo but are nearer nakedness. One way of looking at speech is to say that it is a constant stratagem to cover nakedness. (14)
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Harold Pinter 25
playwright from England 1930–2008Related quotes

“Only one way to cover a story like this, and make that a double, bartender, please.”
Holidays in Hell (1989)

Part V, The Merchant Princes, section 2; originally published as “The Big and the Little” in Astounding (August 1944)
The Foundation series (1951–1993), Foundation (1951)

Introduction, sect. 2
La poétique de la rêverie (The Poetics of Reverie) (1960)