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The Bird of Night
Francis Croft, the greatest poet of his age, was mad. His world was a nightmare of internal furies and haunting poetic vision. Harvey Lawson watched and protected him until his final suicide. From his solitary old age Harvey writes this brief account of their twenty years together and then burns all the papers to shut out an inquisitive world.The tautness and control that characterize Susan Hill’s work are abundantly evident in The Bird of Night as she magnificently handles the heights and depths, the splendours and miseries of madness and friendship.
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1972
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706 people want to read
About the author
Susan Hill
180 books2,264 followersSusan Hill was born in Scarborough, North Yorkshire in 1942. Her hometown was later referred to in her novel A Change for the Better (1969) and some short stories especially "Cockles and Mussels".
She attended Scarborough Convent School, where she became interested in theatre and literature. Her family left Scarborough in 1958 and moved to Coventry where her father worked in car and aircraft factories. Hill states that she attended a girls’ grammar school, Barr's Hill. Her fellow pupils included Jennifer Page, the first Chief Executive of the Millennium Dome. At Barrs Hill she took A levels in English, French, History and Latin, proceeding to an English degree at King's College London. By this time she had already written her first novel, The Enclosure which was published by Hutchinson in her first year at university. The novel was criticised by The Daily Mail for its sexual content, with the suggestion that writing in this style was unsuitable for a "schoolgirl".
Her next novel Gentleman and Ladies was published in 1968. This was followed in quick succession by A Change for the Better, I'm the King of the Castle, The Albatross and other stories, Strange Meeting, The Bird of Night, A Bit of Singing and Dancing and In the Springtime of Year, all written and published between 1968 and 1974.
In 1975 she married Shakespeare scholar Stanley Wells and they moved to Stratford upon Avon. Their first daughter, Jessica, was born in 1977 and their second daughter, Clemency, was born in 1985. Hill has recently founded her own publishing company, Long Barn Books, which has published one work of fiction per year.
Librarian's Note: There is more than one author by this name.
She attended Scarborough Convent School, where she became interested in theatre and literature. Her family left Scarborough in 1958 and moved to Coventry where her father worked in car and aircraft factories. Hill states that she attended a girls’ grammar school, Barr's Hill. Her fellow pupils included Jennifer Page, the first Chief Executive of the Millennium Dome. At Barrs Hill she took A levels in English, French, History and Latin, proceeding to an English degree at King's College London. By this time she had already written her first novel, The Enclosure which was published by Hutchinson in her first year at university. The novel was criticised by The Daily Mail for its sexual content, with the suggestion that writing in this style was unsuitable for a "schoolgirl".
Her next novel Gentleman and Ladies was published in 1968. This was followed in quick succession by A Change for the Better, I'm the King of the Castle, The Albatross and other stories, Strange Meeting, The Bird of Night, A Bit of Singing and Dancing and In the Springtime of Year, all written and published between 1968 and 1974.
In 1975 she married Shakespeare scholar Stanley Wells and they moved to Stratford upon Avon. Their first daughter, Jessica, was born in 1977 and their second daughter, Clemency, was born in 1985. Hill has recently founded her own publishing company, Long Barn Books, which has published one work of fiction per year.
Librarian's Note: There is more than one author by this name.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
July 24, 2024
Francis Croft is a renowned poet who suffers bouts of psychosis. His mental state oscillates between interludes of intense creativity and periods of debilitating madness. Harvey Lawson becomes Croft’s companion and caretaker. Lawson is the only person with access to the poet's incomplete writings, letters, and diaries. He wants to write of his late friend before journalists and academics have a chance to Croft’s life under a microscope. In crafting Croft’s story, Lawson describes the impact of mental illness on both their lives. Lawson wants to portray his friend’s truth, not hiding his problems, but not exploiting them either. The storyline explores the line between genius and insanity.
It seems very realistic to me, especially the poet’s diary. It is a melancholy book that relates the pain of watching a loved one drift into another world. The two become increasingly isolated, one due to illness and the other due to the role of caretaker. It is a book for those who enjoy character-driven novels. The writing is stellar, and I found it easy to become immersed. I am filing it in my category for hidden gems.
4.5
It seems very realistic to me, especially the poet’s diary. It is a melancholy book that relates the pain of watching a loved one drift into another world. The two become increasingly isolated, one due to illness and the other due to the role of caretaker. It is a book for those who enjoy character-driven novels. The writing is stellar, and I found it easy to become immersed. I am filing it in my category for hidden gems.
4.5
September 7, 2021
An engaging, serious, mesmerising, sad, short novel about the twenty years of friendship between two men, Francis Croft, the greatest poet of his age, who was mad, and Harvey Lawson, who worked prior to meeting Francis, in the British Museum. Both men are able to focus on their writing with their small inheritances.
Both men are fairly solitary characters and have few friends. The narrator is Harvey who writes a brief account of their twenty years together. A story about the ups and downs, the good times and bad of madness and friendship.
A very worthwhile reading experience.
This book was first published in 1972 and shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
Both men are fairly solitary characters and have few friends. The narrator is Harvey who writes a brief account of their twenty years together. A story about the ups and downs, the good times and bad of madness and friendship.
A very worthwhile reading experience.
This book was first published in 1972 and shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
July 2, 2014
Susan Hill is sublime. In fewer than 200 pages, she creates the story of an intense relationship between Francis, a poet and Harvey, an academic. Homosexual? Yes, but no sexual content. Tenderness, loyalty and consideration drive the relationship despite Francis' periodic bouts of raving madness. These are truly disturbing. His demons give him no peace and we are launched into a frightening world, with no warning, just like him. She takes us by train to Venice and for endless walks in England. Each scene is wonderfully crafted; you are there.
October 19, 2012
I first read this book in the early 1980s as a postgraduate student. It was the second of Hill's books I had read at the time, the first being Strange Meeting.When I read Bird of Night I considered it the stronger of the two, now I am older I think that Strange Meeting is a better constructed novel, there are of course some similarities. Both novels are about strong male relationships, homosexual, but this is very down played, particularly in Strange Meeting. The lack of sexual content allows the reader to imagine & is more subtle than "bed scenes". We are given a number of very subtle clues to Harvey & Francis's relationship & there is a sense of real love rather than lust.
Bird of Night is excellent in its depiction of mental illness. Francis's obsessions are very believable & some of the details are very disquieting. I suppose I really liked this book because of a lot of the descriptions of English countryside & wildlife. Some of the descriptive writing in this is amongst Hill's best & most evocative.
It seems she gets bored with the characters & almost runs out of steam; the earlier parts of the book are very intense, the last part somewhat disappointing but inevitable.
It always bugged me that Harvey describes a vivid dream, the only one he says he remembers in his long life, but earlier in the book he describes an event that he says he has dreamt many times.
Bird of Night is excellent in its depiction of mental illness. Francis's obsessions are very believable & some of the details are very disquieting. I suppose I really liked this book because of a lot of the descriptions of English countryside & wildlife. Some of the descriptive writing in this is amongst Hill's best & most evocative.
It seems she gets bored with the characters & almost runs out of steam; the earlier parts of the book are very intense, the last part somewhat disappointing but inevitable.
It always bugged me that Harvey describes a vivid dream, the only one he says he remembers in his long life, but earlier in the book he describes an event that he says he has dreamt many times.
October 26, 2014
All my favourite ingredients, poets, the first world war, forbidden love and Susan Hill. Who could ask for more.
August 26, 2012
I searched out this novel after reading Howard’s End is on the Landing and thoroughly enjoying Hill’s writing style. And after finishing The Bird of Night I’m even more convinced of her amazing writing style and ability, it’s no wonder the novel appeared on the Man-Booker shortlist in 1972 and won a Whitbread Novel Award (now called Costa Book Awards), and it’s definitely no surprise I found it stirring. I will definitely have to check out more of her work.
The Bird of Night is a story of love and madness. The narrator of the story, Harvey, looks back on his life and his time spent with Francis, the poet, and Francis’ rise to fame and coinciding decent into madness. There’s no way I can even begin to grasp everything in this compact novel, but I can definitely appreciate the beauty of the language and the intensity of the story. The quote below sort-of sums up the novel, or at least what I got out of the novel.
As usual I’m only going to focus on a few specific points in this response to the novel. The first being Hill’s language. I have rarely read an author whose descriptive capabilities are a match to Hill’s. There is something beautiful, and yet somewhat cruel, in her language. There were passages I wanted to highlight, but at the same time to remove them from the weave of her story would, I think, have ruined them. And although there is A LOT of description it’s not overwhelming or dry like many writers (mostly male) I’ve read.
Click here to continue reading on my blog The Oddness of Moving Things.
The Bird of Night is a story of love and madness. The narrator of the story, Harvey, looks back on his life and his time spent with Francis, the poet, and Francis’ rise to fame and coinciding decent into madness. There’s no way I can even begin to grasp everything in this compact novel, but I can definitely appreciate the beauty of the language and the intensity of the story. The quote below sort-of sums up the novel, or at least what I got out of the novel.
“And if he is mad, it is because one man’s brain cannot contain all the emotions and ideas and visions that are filling his without sometimes weakening and breaking down. But he will be perfectly well again, he is generally well. When he is not he is in despair and when he is fit he dreads the return of his illness. What can that be like to live with?” (149)
As usual I’m only going to focus on a few specific points in this response to the novel. The first being Hill’s language. I have rarely read an author whose descriptive capabilities are a match to Hill’s. There is something beautiful, and yet somewhat cruel, in her language. There were passages I wanted to highlight, but at the same time to remove them from the weave of her story would, I think, have ruined them. And although there is A LOT of description it’s not overwhelming or dry like many writers (mostly male) I’ve read.
Click here to continue reading on my blog The Oddness of Moving Things.
February 7, 2018
Hands down one of the best books I've ever read. The writing style is almost painfully beautiful. So many wonderful bits and paragraphs. I love it *__*
May 14, 2017
This book was a revelation to me. I have read Woman in Black and thoroughly enjoyed it, but this is a deeper novel. The book is beautifully narrated and depicts a believable and touching relationship between the two central men. The sense of place is particularly evocative - I'm about to go to Venice and will carry this book's visions and atmosphere with me there. The examination of madness in relation to creative output is deftly explored without being too cack-handed and sentimental. Also the question of celebrity and art and how important, or not, it is to know about the personal life of the artist. At the beginning of the book it seemed to me a shame that Harvey was insisting there were 'no papers' relating to the late Frances, but by the end of the book I was glad. Ultimately this book is an examination of love and of human fallibility, frailty and endurance. I think it will stay with me quite a while.
December 12, 2013
It took me quite a while to get through this book, but not because it drags or is boring. I thought it was quite good, but it just requires so much thought and downtime. I found that if I read too much in one sitting, I became anxious. I definitely recommend it.
September 1, 2024
An exquisitely written exploration of love, mental illness and tortured genius, this story enchants, maddens and harrows in equal measure. Francis Croft, acknowledged as the best literary poet of the inter-War years, was haunted by mental demons and had, at best, only a fragile grip on reality. He was kept afloat, and enabled to work, only by the devotion, care and careful management of his companion Harvey Lawson, an academic in his own right, but so devoted to Francis that he allowed his own career to take second place to that of his beloved friend.
Now in old age, Harvey is being badgered to release his late companion's notebooks to would-be biographers, and to consent to a 'tell-all' interview about their life together. Although both mental illness and homosexuality are both now better understood (The Bird of Night was first published in 1972), Harvey is determined to protect Francis in death just as he protected him in life, and the only solution seems to be to write his own account, concentrating on the first few years of their twenty year relationship.
It's a heart breaking story, though at times one cannot but wonder how anyone could maintain such devotion to such a self-obsessed, unstable character as Francis - nevertheless I found Harvey's story entirely credible, and so beautifully and insightfully written. Francis' condition would presumably be classified today as bi-polar, and the details of his repeated psychotic episodes are painful to read. The homosexuality is implicit rather than explicit, but even so passages such as Harvey's only meeting with Francis' estranged father, and the hostility and suspicion the pair experience whilst wandering around Venice together late at night, serve as a painful reminder of how things were for gay men back in the day. Prepare to shed tears, ye who read this!
Now in old age, Harvey is being badgered to release his late companion's notebooks to would-be biographers, and to consent to a 'tell-all' interview about their life together. Although both mental illness and homosexuality are both now better understood (The Bird of Night was first published in 1972), Harvey is determined to protect Francis in death just as he protected him in life, and the only solution seems to be to write his own account, concentrating on the first few years of their twenty year relationship.
It's a heart breaking story, though at times one cannot but wonder how anyone could maintain such devotion to such a self-obsessed, unstable character as Francis - nevertheless I found Harvey's story entirely credible, and so beautifully and insightfully written. Francis' condition would presumably be classified today as bi-polar, and the details of his repeated psychotic episodes are painful to read. The homosexuality is implicit rather than explicit, but even so passages such as Harvey's only meeting with Francis' estranged father, and the hostility and suspicion the pair experience whilst wandering around Venice together late at night, serve as a painful reminder of how things were for gay men back in the day. Prepare to shed tears, ye who read this!
April 16, 2025
Susan Hill was apparently dissatisfied with this book, and regarded it as one of her weakest, despite it winning the Whitbread and being her only Booker shortlisted novel. Whilst the novel does have some very slight issues, including an ending which is a little bit rushed, I found her writing to be so extraordinarily moving that I forgave all its shortcomings. This book is now one of my personal favourites, a short sharp gem of sadness and gentleness that burrowed deep into my heart. Hard to find these days, since it is mostly out of print, but worth searching for a secondhand copy online. It is an absolute beauty.
June 27, 2016
A capital "R" Romantic novel about a man caring and fretting over his mentally ill genius poet partner post WWI. The relationship as it's depicted is chaste, which is probably why this was allowed to be published in 1973. The writing is fine, but the story and characters are lacking. What starts as something pretty rich - a man meditating on his great love towards the end of his own life and years after his partner's death - winds up mostly being merely a recounting of illness episodes. There's very little introspection into why Harvey loves Francis and why he continues to care for him alone. There's also only one real scene that shows Francis to be charming and attractive. There are only two moments towards the end in which the story seems to break out of itself, but they are short-lived. The story ends suddenly with a nod towards something that feels as if it's supposed to be profound, though is not. I bought this at a queer pulp novel sale in Pride month. Those books are occasionally great finds. Not so with this one.
September 4, 2021
So much truth broods in in this sombre dusky novel, that it's like decoding a dream. Owls, whales, and other animals haunt the nightmares of Francis, whose mind slips between the reality of his life with Harvey, the half-reality of his poetry, and the insanity that sweeps down like bird wings to smother him and their relationship. It reads simply as a queer love story, remarkably ahead of its time for 1972. It reads too as just a love story, with no sex, but focused instead on the devotional sacrifices that a person will make when smitten. Hill finds small gestures to betoken this love, from the postponement of meals, to the small changes to a shared house. Overarching all too are the much larger sacrifices that come in loving someone who has episodes of insanity: the selfless forfeiture of time with friends or family, and the constant duty of care that unthinkingly are undertaken.
There is a lot in this book that entirely coincentally connects with me, including its places (east coast of Suffolk and Midlands); Benjamin Britten; themes of madness; and aspects of the relationship the book describes. I would hope, however, the book's bitter-sweet meditation on love would speak universally. Certainly for me this was one of the most moving and relatably human books I've read this year.
There is a lot in this book that entirely coincentally connects with me, including its places (east coast of Suffolk and Midlands); Benjamin Britten; themes of madness; and aspects of the relationship the book describes. I would hope, however, the book's bitter-sweet meditation on love would speak universally. Certainly for me this was one of the most moving and relatably human books I've read this year.
September 30, 2023
Reading this is appear to be emotionally drain. I felt so tired with Francis. Tho i felt so tired with Harvey too. I can't count how many times i (unexpectedly) thought "oh i think, is this the time Francis doin suicide?" Which apparently no he didn't. Susan did really keep the information until the end of the book. I felt sorry for Harvey, i can imagine how hard it is. My mom was mentally ill but not as bad as Francis. I know how tired it could be even Harvey's experience is worse than mine despite this is fictional. I don't think i want this reading experience anymore. Reading this is so exhausting. I remember how my heart a bit race or ive become anxious just because I can't wait to finish this book. I kept checking how many pages left. Tho I manage to keep reading it even after how many times i expect to stop reading it...#sigh
July 28, 2022
This was a hard book. Well written in terms of expressing how difficult and painful living with mental illness can be and living with someone who struggles with that can also be, but that makes it really tough at times it’s definitely not escapism - especially if you’ve ever suffered from mental health issues. We didn’t see a full picture of Francis as we rarely got much explanation of what he was up to when he was well so if did make him difficult to see apart from his illness. Harvey is a strange character you might say it’s very loyal that he looks after Francis, sticks by him - but it also seems extremely co-dependent and needy. He almost needs Francis to need him. What would have happened if Francis had fully recovered and not needed Harvey anymore?
Want to read
July 24, 2024I'm sure I read this book a comparatively short time ago, and I'm surprised to see it in the To Read list. I'm also certain a review has been written at the time, but it has somehow disappeared, or else I didnt save it properly.
The truth is I haven't kept many details in my mind about it which in itself is quite telling. I remember a grey, sad story about some young doctors making "scientific" experiments in order to bring the dead to life with rather nefast consequences. It sounds interesting, but somehow it wasn't. It was depressing and predictable and I think it dragged even though it was very short.
As a Susan Hill admirer I was disapointed with this.
The truth is I haven't kept many details in my mind about it which in itself is quite telling. I remember a grey, sad story about some young doctors making "scientific" experiments in order to bring the dead to life with rather nefast consequences. It sounds interesting, but somehow it wasn't. It was depressing and predictable and I think it dragged even though it was very short.
As a Susan Hill admirer I was disapointed with this.
February 3, 2017
This is small novel, but it requires patience and focus to absorb properly.
Published in the 1970s, Harvey is an old man looking back on the period of his own life when he lived with a madman/poet. Harvey was friend and caretaker to Francis Croft, whose madness waxed and waned, but got progressively worse as Francis neared the end of his life. The author seems to be making the argument for madness as a necessary tool for creativity, and the need the world's need of patient caretakers to allow poetry to survive.
Published in the 1970s, Harvey is an old man looking back on the period of his own life when he lived with a madman/poet. Harvey was friend and caretaker to Francis Croft, whose madness waxed and waned, but got progressively worse as Francis neared the end of his life. The author seems to be making the argument for madness as a necessary tool for creativity, and the need the world's need of patient caretakers to allow poetry to survive.
Read
September 10, 2024150 pages of increasingly perfect writing: I loved this melancholy and entirely intriguing novella (another recommendation via the Third Thursday Book Club - it's great when someone really 'gets' the sort of books you love). The unusual subject and compelling narrative reminded me a lot of Richard Coles' brilliant memoir of his lover, 'The Madness of Grief', and I also admired Hill's casual descriptions of the natural world and the dignified modesty with which she treats her two main characters. One for the ages.
August 16, 2025
4 stars
An intense read. The narrator acts as witness to the life and mental illness of the main protagonist, a genius poet. The story portrays the illness and pressure realistically and sympathetically, whilst drawing out the feeling of friendship, partnership and care the narrator has for his companion. A slight criticism for some may be that it is very one note, and the book starts, maintains and ends in the same fashion. Overall an effecting read though
An intense read. The narrator acts as witness to the life and mental illness of the main protagonist, a genius poet. The story portrays the illness and pressure realistically and sympathetically, whilst drawing out the feeling of friendship, partnership and care the narrator has for his companion. A slight criticism for some may be that it is very one note, and the book starts, maintains and ends in the same fashion. Overall an effecting read though
May 2, 2025
Hmm, not sure. Superficially, the story of a loving, caring relationship, but set against the backdrop of the ‘insanity of genius’. I found it difficult to comprehend both the state of mind of Francis and equally the blind devotion of Harvey. That said, beautifully written. Shortlist 1972.
December 13, 2019
Well written but I must admit I wasn’t captivated by the characters
October 14, 2023
Well written but lacking surprise.
May 31, 2024
Good description of a man caring for his friend going through mental health episodes.
Read
October 15, 2024Meh . DNF
November 25, 2024
Depressingly gothic in tone.
December 28, 2024
Very well written but so miserable..
February 28, 2025
Little bit self indulgent dare I say. Perhaps heartless of me I acknowledge.
January 16, 2019
Not the easiest book to read but so splendidly written (strange, no?) about a poet, a mad (?) poet and his friend/companion. Such a beautiful language.. couldn't put it down till finished. For those who want to read an ebook-version it can be borrowed at www.archive.org t
September 11, 2009
Piqued by a reference elsewhere (goodness knows where) I went hunting for this author in the library, and am not sorry for it, though her subject matter is certainly rather depressing. Briefly, then, this is the story of a few years in the life of a brilliant but mentally ill poet, told from the point of view of his long-time (male) companion. It is understood that the relationship is both loving and sexual, but the point is left unstresssed. (In many ways, this is a very British book.) Harvey, the friend, is writing the book in his old age, as an answer to, and in defiance of, the perpetually interfering scholars who keep trying to get their hands on and noses into Francis's (the poet's) papers. It is Harvey's version of the reality of their life and of Francis's illness that will survive. Hill is not really playing unreliable-narrator games here. There are enough excerpts from Francis's diaries to reassure us that we are to take Harvey's perceptions as substantially accurate. No, what is more at issue here is 1) how one lives and copes with a loved one with periodic lapses into severe mental illness (including all the ethical issues of the different kinds of betrayal involved in institutionalizing or not) and 2) the connection - if there is one beyond pure Romantic theorizing - between the genius of the poet and the instability of his mind. Like most moderns, Hill doesn't aspire to solutions in her fiction - just to the accurate and moving portrayal of the problems. I have some limited experience of that slippage of reality (even as the mind continues to function analytically, intelligently) that Francis experiences in so great and terrifying a degree. It is a compliment to Hill, then, that I was taken back all too uncomfortably to that period of my own life when I read this book. As to external references - Francis is an English poet in the '20s. Perhaps he has a real-life brother, maybe even a very obvious one, and my much-overvalued education is failing me again. But I don't care to look. The book is complete in itself. Incidentally, although Hill gives a quite successful indication of the fertility of Francis's mind in excerpts from his journal, she very wisely does not attmept to write his poetry. [These notes made in 1989:].
October 9, 2014
I'm resistant to the idea that there's some essential linkage between artistic genius and insanity, but there are other things of interest here, especially the relationship between the narrator, Harvey Lawson, and the great love of his life, Francis Croft, a poet of genius who slid into hopeless insanity. Their relationship is fraught with ambiguity and interesting complexity. Harvey gives up his life to care for Francis, offering more than twenty years of self-sacrificing devotion to a man who becomes increasingly dangerous and unstable. So why does he do it? He never really examines his own motivation, simply taking it for granted that he must do this. But it's clear to the reader that his whole identity, his entire sense of self, is bound up in Francis. When Francis goes to America and seems to be healthy and happy there, Harvey is miserable; when Francis collapses back into despair, he's relieved. HIs life has meaning again: "I felt a rush of the familiar concern and of misery that he was no better and never would be, that after all, there had been no cure. But more than anything else I felt myself re-orientated. Francis was back. I had not only been unhappy, but I had felt my life to be entirely lacking in purpose, while he had been away." He cares for Francis, tends to him, arguably makes it possible for him to write, at least for a time, but he is also a parasite. He feeds on Francis and Francis's madness. But does he also feed it? Does he make Francis worse? Is he in fact serving Francis by keeping him away from other people, by catering to his paranoia, by keeping him away from doctors and hospitals (of course, in the interwar years these were unlikely to be able to do much for someone who was mentally ill as Francis is), by protecting him from what he fears? Even after Francis is gone, he continues to hoard him, to keep him to himself, appointing himself Francis's sole interpreter to the world, destroying any chance anyone might have of coming into immediate contact with Francis in his own words. Harvey in the end seems the classic sort of unreliable narrator, and the reader has to see past his blind spots.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews