Was Harold Pinter's dialogue intentionally vague?
Vague? I don't know. Is it vague? Or is it simply honest? Life isn't a clear-cut affair, is it? We remember things imperfectly, we misunderstand. In *Betrayal*, the sequence of events is presented in reverse. Memory plays tricks. The characters’ accounts of the past shift, they contradict. That’s not intentional vagueness; it's the nature of the beast. People lie. They deceive themselves as much as others. The dialogue, as you call it, reflects that. It’s a strange business, trying to get to the truth when the very instrument we use – language – is so unreliable.
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