ACTIVITIES ON THE EXCERPT "THE DUMB WAITER"
 

*in italics you have explanations and keys, in blue the aim of the activities

Timing: 2 periods of 50 minutes

PRE-READING ACTIVITIES    Total timing: 10 minutes

FIRST LESSON

The teacher to the class: we are always in a room (the teacher remembers the students that the 'room' theme is common to many of Pinter's plays).

1. Plenary activity

One student reads in front of the class the stage directions at the beginning of the play; 2 other students draw the setting on the blackboard; other two try to act the parts of BEN and GUS (they perform with real things: a newspaper, braces, a matchbox and a cigarette packet) 

2. Plenary activity

Focus your attention on the characters. What sort of relationship do you think they have?

3. Plenary activity

Try to predict what happens during the play
 

AIM: the aim of these activities is to activate interest on the lesson through role playing and making predictions 
 

Timing: 10 minutes 
 

WHILE-READING ACTIVITIES       Total timing: 35 minutes

1. Individual work

Read the text silently (excluded the last stage directions)
 

AIM: students read the text in order to identify the main theme of the excerpt

2. Plenary activity

What is the text dealing with?

The text is about 2 killers waiting in a room to kill someone they don't know.

Timing: 15 minutes

The teacher  explains that the extract is taken from "The Dumb Waiter" at the end of the act and briefly summarizes the plot of the play. In Pinter's plays we often find a COUPLE of people dealing with each other. Each conversation is concrete and realistic, but it has something distinctive. Let's discover together the features of this 'duologue'.

AIM: the aim is to give students information to let them understand the title and to make them better contextualize the dialogue.

3. Individual work

Concentrate on the words of the characters and on the stage directions. Who do you think is the more dominant of the two? Motivate your answer. Go back to the text if you need to.

4. Individual work

Who do you think is the sensitive one? Motivate your answer quoting from the text

(Gus seems sorry when Ben says that there is no difference of behaviour even if the victim is a girl (lines 60-69)).
 

5. Work in pairs

Focus your attention on Ben's behaviour.

Ben's doesn't want to answer Gus, he ignores his questions. What does this attitude create?

√ a growing tension               Gus' indifference                       Ben' s fear

What do you think the evasiveness of Ben's answers represent?

√ Ambiguity                Fear                    Mistrust

What is the function of the 'newspaper game'? It is a stratagem to:

√  escape from Gus' questions                   mock Gus                       waste time

Timing:10 minutes (check included)

AIM: students are encouraged through specific exercises and the help of the teacher to identify the main features of the language style

6. Pinter has spoken of speech as a stratagem designed to cover the nakedness of silence. Are these aims evident in the dialogue of Gus and Ben? Motivate your answer.

(inability to communicate)

7. What does the dumb waiter represent?

√ A symbol for the broken communication between Gus and Ben

   A new way to communicate

   An unusual way to order food

8. What is the function of the repetitions in your opinion?

Pinter uses repetitions to point to violence and the nearness of death

9. And what is the function of the repeated instructions?

(growing tension/violence)

10. What is the function of the echo from the dumb waiter in your opinion?

(Violence)

(the teacher gives more details about the theme violence)

Timing: 10 minutes (check included)

POST-READING/HOMEWORK  
 

Total timing: 5 minutes to explain the activity

Students are divided into four groups. Each group is composed of 4 persons. Each group has a piece of the excerpt (lines 0-59/60-102/103-125/126-180). 2 persons of each group prepare the duologue and they will perform it during the next lesson. (THE TEACHER DOESN'T GIVE THE LAST DIRECTIONS!)

The other two students of each group invent a dialogue or write stage directions or make a summary trying to predict the end of the play (according to the analysed themes: violence, ambiguity, inability to communicate).

The teacher: the role play of each group is a part of the final mark (all the four of each group are responsible for the success!)
 

AIM: through this activity students will be stimulated to revise the passage and the important themes in order to create something new

SECOND LESSON     Total timing: 50 minutes

Students as protagonists

1. Students with their pieces of excerpt perform without interruption.
 

2. Then the students that invented the end of the play intervene and perform or read what they created.

(I think it's better to let students choose what they want to do - perform or only write- because I don't think it's a good idea to force them to play)

Materials: blackboard, a newspaper,  a matchbox,  a tube, braces for two students 

3. The teacher gives the last stage directions: one student reads them, while other two persons play the scene.

THE STUDENTS SHOULD BE SURPRISED

AIM: the aim is to draw conclusions on the main features

Timing: 30 minutes

Comments and opinions (the end of the play and the importance of the stage directions)

Timing: 10 minutes

What is the function of the silence in your opinion?

(Possible answers: Underneath the silence is the threat of violence/ the anticipation of something deadly).

In this play there is a menace threatening the life of the characters. In "The room" the menace came from the outside world. And in "The Dumb Waiter"?

(Possible answers: Ben / the man speaking through the dumb waiter)

Timing: 10 minutes