[Pinter's note in the 1980 text of The Hothouse] places The Hothouse between The Birthday Party and The Caretaker. What may appear surprising in this chronological arrangement is the relation between The Birthday Party and the lately produced play. Without the author's guidance spectators and readers would tend to consider The Hothouse as a preparatory exercise for The Birthday Party. It is a comparatively easy Pinter: his characteristic technique is used less economically and discreetly in it than in the other plays of the same period. One simple consequence of this appears in the length of the text. In the Methuen edition The Hothouse covers about 150 pages as against 30 for The Room, 40 for The Dumb Waiter, 80 for The Caretaker and 90 for The Birthday Party. It looks as if the play had not undergone the process of elimination and concentration that has led to the enigmatic compactness of the rest...