Here is a well-judged piece by Johann Hari trying to work out how Harold Pinter ended up supporting Slobodan Milosevic:

Pinter himself says "the most important line I’ve ever written" is when Meg’s husband calls out, as Stanley is taken away, "Stan, don’t let them tell you what to do." The playwright said of this unobjectionable, obvious platitude, "I’ve lived that line all my damn life. Never more than now."

It’s depressingly revealing: Pinter’s staccato sinisterness does not illustrate a point; it distracts the audience from the fact his point is so banal.

Pinter was the archetypal Silly Noise. The fact that as he got older his noises became louder and sillier – to a level of volume and silliness meriting the award of the Nobel Prize – is a gloomy insight into the times we live in.

A comment (apparently from someone in Paris) on the Times website describes him as a ‘moral giant’.

Peut-être I am old-fashioned or insufficiently French, but in my view anyone who ends up on Milosevic’s side is surely more aptly described as a moral ant.

Last word with Johann Hari:

I once tried to discuss his defence of Milosevic with him and he began to scream – literally scream – at me.

Goodbye. Harold. Pinter. You shouldn’t. Have defended. Milosevic. (Stage directions: Off-stage, there are howls and screams of rage. We do not know if these are from ethnic Albanians murdered by Milosevic, or from Pinter himself.)