It is certainly not easy to describe the develo~pment that Pinter has gone through over the past ten years,f4 but, in my opinion, there are two clear trends that can be recognised. As Pinter's critics have observed, Betrayal (1979) was an uncommon play for him insofar as he no longer employed the techniques of mystification that were characteristic of his previous plays. IS The alienation of reality is achieved not by a deficit of infonnation on the part of the audience, but by a surplus of information in comparison to the characters on stage. This is effected by a reversal of chronology. Pinter begins with a portrayal of the present, then blends back into the past. Whereas the characters are of course blind to what the future has in,~,store for them, the audience knows where it will end. This is a kind of parallel to A Kind ofAlaska and to Family Voices. Here too the audience knows how the characters are doing, whereas the latter lack this infonnation. The first effect which is achieved by this distribution of information is that the action on the stage appears less mysterious, more probable and therefore more "realistic" than that of Pinter's earlier plays. Secondly--and this applies to both Betrayal and Family Voices--the actual drama takes place in the minds of the audience, so that there is a shift of focus from the mimetic towards the receptional pole of Pinter's dramaturgy.