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 In
1989, Harold Pinter wrote a remarkably potent one-act
play called Mountain Language which I had the
pleasure of directing in its American premiere at CSC
Repertory in New York in repertory with his earlier
full-length play The Birthday Party. Mountain
Language is a stark and aggressive piece of work
set in a prison for political dissidents in an unnamed
country at an unspecified time. In this hostile landscape,
communication is forbidden, and language has become
the tool of the oppressor, whose torrent of words infects
the atmosphere. The owners of the language in this world
use words to gain power over those who have threatened
them by some form of dissent. Most frighteningly, the
linguistic rules of these oppressors are totally arbitrary;
indeed, it is their arbitrariness which makes them lethal.
Early on in the play, the women are told that they are
forbidden to speak their own language: "You are
mountain people. You hear me? Your language is dead.
It is forbidden." From this moment forth, only
the language of the capital is to be spoken. Naturally
most of them don’t know the language of the capital,
and when they continue to speak their own language,
the only language they know, they are beaten. Suddenly,
in a moment of terrifying heartlessness, a Guard informs
an elderly woman that she is permitted to speak her
language again. Just like that. No explanations necessary.
Tragically, by the time her own words are "restored"
to her, they are useless. She is too traumatized to
speak at all, and sits in silence as her son tries to
communicate with her.
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