Politics & Power Quote by Howard Barker

A playwright confessing to “plenty of…prejudices” and then shrugging them off as worthless is less a moral flex than a manifesto for the stage. Howard Barker’s line works because it separates possession from devotion: he admits the mind’s inevitable clutter - opinions, bias, private irritations - while refusing to treat any of it as sacred. The sting is in the second sentence. “Value” is a financial verb. Barker frames ideology as a currency many people hoard for status, belonging, and the cheap thrill of certainty. He’s saying: yes, I have these coins, but I don’t worship money.

The subtext is anti-tribal and anti-slogan, which fits Barker’s reputation for “Theatre of Catastrophe” - drama that distrusts easy ethics and resists being recruited into causes. In a cultural climate where artists are expected to declare alignment, this reads as a refusal of the audition. Barker isn’t claiming neutrality; he’s claiming hierarchy. Political views exist, but art - and perhaps the darker, messier truth of human motivation - sits above them.

There’s also a sly jab at self-congratulating progressivism: admitting prejudice is fashionable, but renouncing its value is the harder move. He implies that the real danger isn’t having bias (unavoidable), it’s fetishizing it as identity. For theatre, that’s oxygen: characters become complicated when the author isn’t using them to cash out a thesis.