Harold Pinter and others have written to the Press calling for a peaceful response rather than war in reaction to the New York outrage.

In an open letter in reaction to the terrorist attacks in the United States, Harold Pinter and others have called for a peaceful response, on the grounds that the best way to get rid of terrorism is to eradicate poverty.

Pinter, who has recently enjoyed a season at the Lincoln Center in New York, has long been known for his anti-American views, but the letter pointedly avoids blaming American policies for terrorism. Instead it concentrates on the fact that "Terrorism is the language of hatred and despair."

Pinter is joined as a signatory by, among others, husband and wife Corin Redgrave and Kika Markham. Once known to the general public as much for his politics as his acting, Redgrave has in recent years proved himself to be as impressive an actor as his father, Sir Michael, winning critical plaudits on both sides of the Atlantic, and scored a particular hit in New York with Tennessee Willliams' "lost" prison drama, Not About Nightingales, so his voice might carry a greater weight with American readers than would have been the case in the past.

—by Paul Webb Theatrenow