Harold Pinter frequently used pauses and silence in his plays to convey hidden meanings beyond what was said. Pinter believed that silence could communicate as much as speech. In his play The Birthday Party, he employs three types of pauses - ellipses indicated by three dots, dashes, and a "pregnant pause" to leave space for unspoken dialogue. Pinter thought people try to hide their true selves and communicate through what goes unsaid in their silence. At the end of the play, the line "The rest is silence" from Hamlet reflects how silence can be as meaningful as what is spoken.

1. PINTERESQUE…Pinter Pause and Silence in ‘ The Birthday Party’Prepared By : Pooja N. Trivedi M.A. Part - II Sem – III Paper – E-C-301 Modernist Literature Roll No. Year - 2011

2. Painteresque : term - used especially of dialoguelengthy pauses,

3. loaded with varied hidden meanings.“The speech which we hear is an indication of that which we don't hear ... When true silence falls we are still 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.”- Samuel Beckett

4. Three Different Pauses In Pinter:Three Dots: ellipsis, dashes

5. A Pause : pregnant pauses