Goldsmiths - University of London

The College-based Pinter Centre for Performance and Creative Writing was formally inaugurated in June 2003, with Harold Pinter as Honorary President.

This is an interdisciplinary research centre, involving principally the Departments of English & Comparative Literature and of Drama, the latter organising and hosting the Centre, and with links with Media and Communications, Music, PACE and the Digital Studios.

Though he is best known as a playwright, what distinguishes Harold Pinter is his achievement in several different media – as a poet, novelist, screenwriter, dramatist for television and radio, and polemicist for freedom of expression and human rights. In keeping with this, through its projects the Pinter Centre initiates and promotes research into all aspects of the theory and practice of creative writing and performance.

In line with Pinter’s keen awareness of the centrality of political issues, the Centre is particularly committed to looking at postcolonial and diasporic literature and performance, and the ways in which contemporary creativity is forging new forms that respond to the cultural diversity of the world in which we live. It also has a strong interest in questions of gender, and writing and performing the body.