“Please heed the pauses and silences in this play”: Analyzing Nonverbal Communication in the Works of Annie Baker and Harold Pinter

ABSTRACT This article compares the use of pauses, hesitations, and silences in the plays of Harold Pinter and Annie Baker, two writers who are very different but have often been compared in the popular press for their willingness to depict uncomfortably long moments onstage where no one is speaking. Examining how Baker’s detailed stage directions and interviews emphasize the different affective charges a pause can carry, it argues that Pinter’s use of silence is equally multifaceted. It also considers how the two playwrights use pauses to convey different perspectives on failures of human communication, as Baker’s characters can’t verbally articulate what they’re feeling, whereas Pinter’s characters can’t stop themselves from nonverbally articulating what they’re feeling.