A Domestic Animal

by Francis King

Francis King's 1970 novel A Domestic Animal is the story of Antonio Valli, a brilliant young Italian philosopher, who arrives to do a year's research at a well-to-do university. He lodges with Dick Thompson, a successful middle-aged novelist, and his good looks and impulsive yet immensely likeable character soon have Dick captivated. Valli is someone who needs to be admired and loved and has an insatiable craving for attention from everyone he meets; he needs an audience to perform to and he finds this at the university, but especially in Dick's company. It is not long before Dick Thompson has fallen completely in love with his charming - but very heterosexual - lodger. What follows is an ill-fated relationship that can only end in disaster, but in A Domestic Animal King has created a novel of bitter longing and painful complexities. 'Few English novelists have written with more might and assurance . . .' Spectator

Genres: Fiction, Classics, Queer, LGBT, Gay, Literary Fiction, British Literature

211 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1970

About the author

There is more than one author with this name

Francis Henry King, CBE, was a British novelist, poet and short story writer.

He was born in Adelboden, Switzerland, brought up in India and educated at Shrewsbury School and Balliol College, Oxford. During World War II he was a conscientious objector, and left Oxford to work on the land. After completing his degree in 1949 he worked for the British Council; he was posted around Europe, and then in Kyoto. He resigned to write full time in 1964.

He was a past winner of the W. Somerset Maugham Prize for his novel The Dividing Stream (1951) and also won the Katherine Mansfield Short Story Prize. A President Emeritus of International PEN and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, he was appointed an Officer (OBE) of the Order of the British Empire in 1979 and a Commander of the Order (CBE) in 1985.

Reviews

[Doug]

As the scarcity of reviews/ratings for this attest, Francis King seems to have been all but forgotten these days - although this and his novel Act of darkness were both longlisted for the Booker Prize; this one for the 'Lost Booker' for books published in 1970, when this first came out (after some revisions necessitated when one of King's compatriots sued him, claiming that one of the characters was based on him!), and it's astonishingly frank about homosexuality, which was so NOT the case back then.

The book details the frustrated longings of English novelist Dick Thompson (surely an autobiographical stand-in for the author, although he denied that), for his masculine, but infuriatingly obtuse Italian tenant, Antonio. Antonio has a wife and kids back home, but while camping out at Dick's flat, takes up with a common and rather vulgar young woman, Pam. This, of course, raises Dick's hackles, but he tries his best to sublimate his jealousy and ardent feelings.

While the plot is engrossing, what really sets this apart is the prose itself, which on a line-by-line basis is some of the finest in contemporary literary fiction. I'll be reading more of King's back catalogue, he's just that good.

[Liam Ostermann]

I must state again that I love the work of Francis King - I think he is a novelist and short story writers whose work has never been acknowledged for its quality - he was immensely prolific (at least by today's standards) but what stands out is how good his books are. Almost all his works contain or are suffused with elements or sub plots that are queer or at the very least contain strong sexual attraction between men. 'A Domestic Animal' was his most openly Gay or Queer novel and it is a very fine tale of the love/desire of one man for another (unreciprocated in terms of desire but not necessarily in terms of love - but what, or maybe better on whose, terms?).

It can appear at times that the milieu - social, intellectual, political - in which his novels are set is a vanished one and thus his books might at one stage have said to have dated - but as time goes on it is amazing how irrelevant that seems now as the world and the mores that replaced the ones of Mr. King's youth no longer seem new or exciting or, it some cases, even relevant and often they now appear tawdry and unmemorable. Mr. King's novels are ageing well, their great strengths shine forth and the relevance of their settings seems irrelevant - after all do we care that the worlds of Austen and Dickens are more alien to us?

Mr. King was one of number of very fine English novelists who tackled gay themes in many ways and forms long before ' gay liberation' came to the fore in the USA (which is not in anyway meant to lessen the importance of what the American movement brought to Gays in the UK) who had a distinctive voice and covered 'gay' themes in a different but often more open way then was current in the USA but writers like Francis King, Angus Wilson and many others have for to long been sidelined first by their Post-Stonewall American competitors and then secondly by the generation of UK writers, such as Alan Hollinghurst and Patrick Gale, who are treated as if they are the first UK 'gay' writers dealing with 'gay' subjects to have success with non-gay readers. I don't begrudge any writer trying to sell books but this ridiculous assumption that 'straight' readers can't and won't read about 'gay' characters/situations is simply not held up by history. Mr. King and others were doing this long before there was a 'gay' market and this novel deserves to been remembered and read not simply as an important work in the gay cannon but as a fine novel.

Again I want to pay tribute to Gay Men's Press who reissued this novel and many other unique works and whose loss is still greatly to be regretted. It also has a very fine and attractive cover art - something that was sadly lacking on many brilliant GMP publications - in fact so much of the cover art was excruciatingly bad that I feel it my duty to highlight the exceptional good ones.

[Derek Driggs]

Totally superb and bound to be a favorite of the year. Francis King was well liked in his time but has been largely forgotten, but I agree with his contemporaries that he is a prose artist in the class of Greene and Nabokov. I haven’t read something so simply and unadornedly heart-breaking since Isherwood’s A Single Man. Captures with terrible accuracy the ill-fated unrequition gay men so often face, not only in their romantic lives but in any hope of understanding from the outside world.

The narrator is not necessarily virtuous or selfless but he is oh, so human and sympathetic.

I wish I could read more, but it seems most of his many books are out of print… we will see how resourceful I can be in reading more and learning more of this great writer!

[Samuel Gordon]

Not at all what you'd expect from a novel written in the late 60s. Also loved reading about the libel lawsuit that financially ruined the author because of this book. I think this has to be the 2nd best King book I've read thus far after To The Dark Tower.

[Bill Muganda]

One sitting, utterly frustrating, and it was the perfect length.

A weird relationship emerges between an English writer and an Italian philosopher, one sided yearning from the writer, that slowly chips away at his self worth . You grow to emphasize with him, as that space of unrequited love almost feels like an infection, that he just can’t seem to get rid off. At multiple times I almost threw the book at the wall but it still managed to hold my attention.
I need more underrated queer classics like this one.

[✿]

4.5
JAW ON DA FLOOR! 😦

[Lucas]

surprised this novel isn’t more popular! a tale of unrequited love and written very well, particularly the latter half which had me hooked. problematic in some ways but this book was written in 1960s england by an intellectual homosexual and self described closet queen and still feels relevant! more people should read this

[Gregisdead121]

"It will be with me always—something to live with and something to die
with and something that is now so indissolubly a part of myself that I
cannot conceive of a future without it.
I can only pray again to the God in whom I have never believed: O God,
teach me to care and not to care."

Love chisels the the one who loves to the bone ,subtly they can be reduced to rubble without protest by every waking thought being possessed. And yet the potential of that destruction possibly being an apotheosis into a form more enduring- Michaelangelo's David - allows for oblivion to have the taste of creation.

We meet the protagonist of "A Domestic Animal "- Dick Thompson, after it's all played out: the infatuation, exploitation and disintegration . The reader of the novel spends its duration catching up to him as he unravels this maddening encounter with a man who would not love him. Thompson, a privileged moderately acclaimed writer of criticism & reviews is immediately besotted by the handsome Italian tenant -Antonio Valli- that his neighbor (and friend) has taken up.

Francis King is masterful at engaging with the past without fanfare yet still allowing it to ripple with the occasion of an event. The collision of these two men is so banal and yet as the reader it is clear that a form of predation has taken place even if the role of hunter and prey aren't obvious. Antonio Valli and Dick Thompson engage in a platonic but intimate relationship thick with possession, weak with fear- a dependency trapping both of them in an unhealthy dynamic of zealot and idol. Fortunately the story being delivered in retrospect, as a story the narrator is writing to sift through his feelings, allows for the wisdom of the future to intrude on the past:

"It is painful for me now to remember my coolly insulting answers; but I
must do so if this story is to serve the purpose I have designed for it. It is
easy to blame my conduct on certain chemical changes in the blood; but
they merely precipitated what was already there, as a hot compress draws
out the pus that lurks deep in an abscessed wound."

This narrative choice gives the novel more than one story to tell as the reader engages with the narrators state of mind then & now , simultaneously. Omnisciently, the reader is made privy to all the cracks that make up its eventual fracture. Loneliness holds each character hostage inside themselves. Often times desire would be metered by the complications of their reality, like a word forgotten on the tip of the tongue,it would remain amorphous and intangible. This loneliness ultimately shapes the entirety of the novel, driving its cast to despair with failed attempts to vanquish its null. Dick Thompson, a comfortable bisexual man, though not proud of his identity is not tortured by his same sex attraction. What vexes him is the rarity of reciprocity, the reproach either by society or objects of desire who find the intrest disgusting. Francis King not making Dick Thompson self hating makes 'A Domestic Animal ' soar far above other contemporary novels published in the aftermath of homosexuality's decriminalization in the U.K. It must've been so refreshing to read a gay novel not preoccupied with the shame of its queer characters, instead giving their romantic trials the same credence as that of heterosexual romances.

Francis King is unsparing as an author, giving the reader no place to hide. He uses sex as a form of displacement that forces its participates deeper inside of themselves thus further from the expected euphoria of orgasm. The body a sentence to an imprisonment that can only be shared but not escaped:

"In a savage despair I sank myself abruptly into her; she gave a little
scream, those silvery nails digging deep into the skin of my neck. His body
has sweated on your body, as I am sweating on it now. His odours have
lingered here as mine will linger. Deep inside of you some essence of him
lurks and will, however vestigially, lurk forever, just as some essence of me
will also lurk there, a part of your physiology as much as of your memory.
With each stab that brought from her a shuddering moan, whether of pain or
of pleasure, I seemed to be obliterating her, to reach through to him."

Antonio Valli, the titular 'Domestic Animal ' ,reveals with all his vanity and selfishness the precarity of devotion. That to fall in love and to be in love are two wholly different things. To fall is a dangerous almost fatal activity that can happen to you alone, that when done without the one you've fallen for to catch you, can end similarly a suicide descending from a great height. There is no safety in falling. But to be in love is to co-exist, to exist in an agreed upon emotional landscape with someone who feels the same- to be let in. 'A Domestic Animal ' documents the agony of not being let it, allowed to accelerate towards a certain doom. Love with its ability to overwhelm, reassure and devastate is an emotion that magnifies its bearers pre-existing flaws. It cannot be a cure even when it lays out the symptoms for all to bare:

‘Italians are not really domestic animals’; but all three of us had been
determined to make of him a household pet. Pam and I had failed, as we
had always been doomed to fail; Chiaretta had succeeded, having caught
him young enough and trained him soon enough. He would always want to
escape and he would never escape. Perhaps on other occasions in his life he
would see a possible refuge in the devotion of a man like myself or of a
woman like Pam. But that plump hand, the ball of lead, would always be
there; the two children, and how many more to follow, would always be
there; and that terrible, stultifying morality of a class to which he did not
really belong but to which he felt he must belong would always be there.
Pam and I were unhappy; but ours was the unhappiness of those who
have acknowledged the deepest needs of their natures and have achieved
the perfect freedom that comes from service to those needs, however
fruitless that service. Antonio was unhappy because he only knew obscurely
what those deepest needs were, and because he was ashamed of them and
frightened of them.

[WndyJW]

Another fantastic republished gem from @mcnallyeditions. I'll be thinking about this one for awhile, wondering how Dick is doing and if Antonio found what he was looking for. This is an intimate portrait of the torment Dick's unrequited love caused him and of the torment Antonio's obsession with fellow college student Pam caused him and the conflict of loving his family and chafing at the constraints of marriage.

The humor comes in the banter between the fussy, particular Dick with his home full of lovely, valuable items and the effusive, live for the moment Antonio, who leaves a mess everywhere he goes. The warmth between Dick and Antonio is touching and the story well written and well paced. I highly recommend this very human story.

[milliebrewer]

a forgotten queer classic. the last 50-odd pages had me HOOKED, and the last passage is one of the best i've ever read. also, one of the best 'title moments' ever! definitely dated in its approach to queerness and ethnicity, but still holds up surprisingly well, and i think would resonate with readers even more today!

[Steven]

tl;dr this lost classic of unrequited love and lust is a potent snapshot of late 1960s gay life, stuffy summer heat choking each fraught interaction

He put an arm round my shoulder, his body, with its smell of healthy sweat—how well I came to know that smell, how evocative it still is for me when I catch it faintly from the drawers into which he used, higgledy-piggledy, to stuff his dirty clothes—pressed against mine. All at once I felt limp and enervated in contact with all that remorseless vitality. (42)

The 21st century marketing for this novel often points out that it was published only 3 years after the decriminalization of homosexuality; that's right: homosexuality was technically only legal from 1967 onwards. Both World Wars fought; the height of Beatlemania had passed; man was just about to land on the moon. And so, just about 60 years after UK's decriminalization of homosexuality (not yet a US senior citizen), Francis King's A Domestic Animal has been reissued by McNally editions, its first publishing in the United States.

Predating the breadth of language we have at our disposal today, Francis King's pioneering, frank portrayal of midcentury gay life lays it all out: the denial, the shame, and the steep, steep climb of acceptance. All this tells the story of that very universal, very gay experience: falling for a straight (?) boy -- or at the very least, unrequited love.

Naturally morose by temperament, I felt an astonishing exhilaration; naturally critical, I noticed how my judgements of others had suddenly grown generous. Friends would say to me ‘ How well you are looking!’ Or even ‘How happy you seem!’ The house, which for months had fretted me like a thorn beneath a finger-nail, had now come to seem totally unimportant. (29)

The everyday of Dick, our protagonist, is utterly upended when a gorgeous footballer with long hair, suede boots, and corduroy trousers named Antonio becomes a boarder at his house. Dick isn't able to make sense of his feelings towards Antonio; at the time he was aware of his sexual proclivities, but with Antonio, at least at first, he thought he was feeling unprecedented feelings of intense male friendship. A lot of Dick's experiences were almost laughably familiar, especially the jealousy, feeding the anger at unreciprocated feeling, which leads to Dick being absolutely horrible to Antonio (himself not a character of great moral standing).

There is, however, the very real feeling of wanting to be seen, acknowledged, and known, all things not completely possible in the setting of Domestic Animal; Dick isn't naive to the reality of gay discrimination, even as he finds fellow "sisters":

“Most homosexuals, however great their reticence in youth, begin by middle age to undergo a process of loosening-up. Many, as I know from my acquaintances, even suffer from a suicidal impulse to betray themselves at every turn. But as I had grown older the carapace of secrecy had become not softer but more and more impenetrable around me. To a few of my closest friends I would speak freely of my secret life; but when at some chance encounter a homosexual, divining my true nature with that extraordinary instinct most inverts possess, embarked on the humiliating process of ‘letting down hair’, I would feel both panic and horror and would at once pretend to have no inkling of the trend of his remarks.” 71

I think there is something oddly comforting, if not, then cathartic, about reading about the gay struggle being very real and very relatable throughout different parts of history. I feel very lucky to be born in the circumstances I'm in, lucky that I'm mostly around folks who understand and accept me. But even now, the need for that "carapace of secrecy" feels necessary at times, and definitely was the case when I was younger.

Being able to relate to Dick, in all of his flights of passion and wild emotion, are what made the reading experience of A Domestic Animal so remarkable. I found it difficult to put down, wanting to see how consuming his feelings for Antonio would get, how much messier Antonio and Pam would get together, and what kind of impact this would leave on Dick by the end of the book. How to resolve the unresolvable?

Echoes of this book resonate throughout contemporary gay literature; the Italian Summer haze of Call Me By Your Name, the heady uncertainty of Dancer from the Dance, even the earthy heat of something like Tash Aw's The South. In being so frank about the gay experience, Francis King offers a window into understanding what it was like for anyone who was willing to at the time. But it'd be a disservice to simply call this a time capsule; it's a striking, messy, and emotional portrait of humanity that rings true past its time of publication.

[Bill Silva]

3.5 stars…rounded down because of the tiresome misogyny of the main character/narrator…his generalized misanthropy is bad enough, but the denigration of just about every female character gets rather annoying. All that said, this is about as devastating (both affecting and convincing) a portrayal of unrequited love and desire as anything I’ve ever read…and it truly goes to show that there’s no accounting for taste in these situations. The novel is described as being “tragicomic”—there aren’t many laughs in my opinion, and it’s rather bleak in its outlook on human relationships of any kind. Great writing, though!

[Olya Z]

It’s a love story. someone can give love away even when they know it will never be reciprocated. another person can receive it without caring about its worth and use it only for their own benefit. it's a story about longing, jealousy and manipulation. it’s about the freedom to give without expecting anything in return and the feeling of being imprisoned in relationships you can’t get out of.

[Isa Bay]

I do love a petty bitch

[David]

It's a university town and everyone has international lodgers. Penny has Masa from Japan, Antonio from Italy and a dreadful Swiss girl. In her opinion, Italians aren't domestic animals and so she's keen to be rid of Antonio.

Fortunately, he's a bit of a hunk (if you like hairy shoulders and tight brown corduroy) and her friend Francis agrees to take him in.

Antonio enjoys Francis's company but only ends up shagging the fairly dreadful Pam. Poor old Francis is incredibly jealous.


"'Why do all these Japanese suffer from piles?'"

"Quite the toast of Oxford – even if the toast was beginning to get a little charred."

"'I saw Diana in the supermarket yesterday and I stared her straight in the face … But of course she wouldn't meet my gaze – oh no! All at once she became tremendously interested in the meat-counter – and her a vegetarian!'"

"'Ralph and Mervyn – I cannot understand two men living together like that.'
'Can't you? Why not?'
Suddenly his tone of contemptuous superiority began to make me angry.
'Two men living together like a married couple – it is ridiculous.'
'I think that your marriage is far more ridiculous.'
His head swivelled round, so that it was no longer gazing with a moody intensity out of the window of the train but gazing at me. I had astonished him: that, and not indignation or anger, was his dominant emotion.
'What do you mean?'
'Ralph and Mervyn have lived together ever since they were students. Ten years, eleven years. As far as I know they've never been unfaithful to each other. I've never once seen them quarrel. I see nothing "ridiculous" in a relationship like that. Whereas your marriage – writing letters every morning to your wife and fucking Pam every evening – does seem to me ridiculous. A farce.'"

[Trin]

An English writer falls for his Italian lodger -- a sexy, slutty philosopher/footballer -- and, you are told from the beginning, receives no satisfaction. A bit too repetitive and self-serious for me, though I did laugh at the (unintentionally?) hilarious scene in which the protagonist comes untouched from listening to his Italian crush read a philosophy paper aloud to him.

[Jye O'Leary]

sacrifice gives value to the thing for which it is made

[Clark]

Incredibly well written. I couldn’t put it down. Full of anguish, ennui, lust, longing, heartbreak and hurt. Powerful stuff.

[Joshua Quiñones]

The sheer deliciousness of King's prose is exemplified in the novel's opening pages: "As he shook my hand it was as though some piece of machinery, long left unused and untended, slowly began to grind into movement through hampering encrustations of rust and dust and dirt. It was to be several days before the machine was functioning properly; and now, as it whirs remorselessly, crazily on and on and on, I wonder how many years it will be before it can be stilled" (5). Dick Thompson is a protagonist who is both remarkably self-aware and fanciful, at times in control of himself and his circumstances and at other times capricious in his bending to the emotional pull of his lodger, Antonio. Any gay man who has ever been confused by his feelings for a straight peer—be they romantic, sexual, familial, or some amalgamation of those and more—will see himself in Dick's longing. King's ability to delve into the depths of the psyche in deeply personal ways echoes the best qualities of Virginia Woolf's writing; not since To the Lighthouse have I read such revealing and breathtaking passages. This is a book I will return to frequently to study what King does with his prose, the magical lyricism he casts throughout the novel.

[Brandon Carestia]

Review: 4.6/5
Phew. Talk about a novel that captures unrequited love. The narrator’s fixation on a man who can’t love him back teeters between understandable longing and uncomfortable obsession. King captures the narrator’s emotions with poetic ease. I’d highly recommend this if you’re looking for a queer novel to read in 2026.

[Sam Weiler]

justice for Masa!!!

[Natt]

I’m noticing an increased popularity (or production) of books like The Talented Mr Ripley - other titles that come to mind include The Party, Lucien, The Secret History (?), Jack the Modernist, The School of Night - and while this one is probably on the “milder” side, it was just as mildly uncomfortable to read. I struggle so much with unlikeable characters and King really made sure that we treated Antonio as an overgrown spoiled brat. Absolutely beautifully written, with some poignant moments of unrequited love. The story is a netting of half-formed relationships of one person pining for another, the desire spreading like an infectious condition.
While initially cliched, the relational triangle between Dick, Antonio, and Pam, developed in (trans-)embodied ways that would intrigue Sedgwick. I remain unconvinced by the depiction of the main character, who self-characterises as the go-getter, attaining anything he puts his sight on, while remaining the most impotent and pushover character I’ve ever seen - not sure whether that’s an inconsistency or a well done self-misconception; I’m gonna treat it as the latter.

[Sean Dalton]

McNally Editions have yet to disappoint me.

This books was written beautifully and I loved how King used time in his point of view. The observations of people are fantastic, but his dissection of the feeling attached to unrequited love was masterful. The language was perfectly specific and casually profound. Dick writes from the future and as such leaves guideposts telling where the story is heading, and yet I still found myself turning page after page in anticipation of the plot. I really enjoyed my time with this book.

[ava]

“I closed my eyes; and suddenly I found myself muttering a prayer to the God in whom I did not believe: 'O God, teach me to care and not to care, oh, teach me to care and not to care? No, I could not wish not to care for him entirely; I did not wish to step down off that cross. But I wanted to have the intensity of love without this intensity of suffering.”

[Marie Amoyi]

One of the best books I’ve ever read.

[Allison]

incredible!! we follow our main guy Mr. Dick Thompson, who hosts a 33yr old Italian foreign exchange student in his home for a year and falls in love with him, but has to be very discreet and also just watches this man cheat on his wife and family multiple times as he is not able to be “a domestic animal”, and tied down to anything. love the writing and love the yearning <3

[Harry Smith]

This was lovely

[ari!!!]

I ventured out to Greenwich Village to find a physical copy of The Secret History (spoiler alert!!! shit book), and I set out to buy that and only that. They say never to judge a book by its cover, but it kind of worked in my case, because the McNally print has this strangely alluring cover of a man laying nude on a bed. I thought it was going to be some nihilist novel or something, and the last thing I expected was to find out that it was about a guy falling in love with another guy. Of course, why would I ever miss out on reading this quirky middle-aged BL? It seems like so much fun, I thought.

It ended up being one of the most heartbreaking and emotionally devastating books I've ever read about the reality of unrequited, gay love.

My god, Dick Thompson you don't know how much I'm crying for you. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I literally read this whole book within 24 hours (instead of studying for finals LOL), but the whole time I could not stop reading, which almost happens like never. Antonio is such a fucking asshole, but it's shitty characters like him that make it feel real and actually believable. Part of me pushing through this book was so I could get to the part where they kiss or have hate sex or whatever. I was a bit disappointed that nothing of the sort actually happens, but in retrospect it only makes Dick's love (haha funny) for Antonio that much more painful; to feel all of those things without ever being granted the pleasure of physical intimacy.

It's such a fucked up story, one that hurts too much for me to process. And strangely enough, even someone as unexperienced as me drew parallels to it all, and I think it is because of these connections that I really loved this book.

---

I sometimes think back to this one guy from high school who, in retrospect, I’m pretty sure I had a crush on. It’s so rare for me to say that, mainly because of how trashy and toxic I knew the men at my school to be. His friendship with me didn’t feel superficial; one moment we could be laughing over the stupidest things ever online, and then serious conversations and deep talks with each other right afterwards.

I really did love him, and I loved being in his company all the time. I remember feeling jealous when he’d hang out with other girls, or when he'd talk to me about how much he missed this ex or hated that ex. I called myself stupid for feeling this way because, of course, I was simply his friend, a school friend nonetheless. Where could I, a spineless boy like me, have possibly stood in his love life? The closest thing I got to reciprocation from him was when with those "gay jokes" boys often do with each other. It was just an excuse for me to lay on him or touch him, and he didn't mind much, or so I think.

My senior trip was a 13-day trip all the way to Germany and the Alps. We'd usually be in a different hotel every night, with different roommates assigned randomly from a list you'd fill out beforehand, stating who you'd like to room with and who you wouldn't. For the most part, I simply roomed with other classmates who I got along with well, nothing crazy there. But it was when we arrived in Switzerland, I remember, that I was to room with him for the night. I remember being so excited at the prospect of having him all for myself, which sounds funny because I'm not the type to initiate.

We had spent the whole day beforehand cramped in a coach bus, and all we were to do at this hotel was simply shower, sleep, and wake up at the crack of dawn to leave for the mountains the next day. There wasn't much I could do, really, other than talk with him casually as we both got ready for the bed. His stupid half-brother (whom i never liked) came in barging at one point, along with some other mutuals, and I had to just sit there irritated as he conversed rowdily about sneaking out or drinking or some other stupid, immature shit.

Eventually he went away, and neither of us were feeling tired so we decided to distract ourselves with beautiful Swiss German TV. I think we watched Family Guy, or "Familienmensch" as they say, while he went on and on about how much he missed his ex. She was a classmate of ours (usually his exes are from different schools or whatever), and the three of us formed a small trio during our time abroad. He would go on and on about how he really fucked up during freshman year by cheating on her ("Promise you won't tell anyone, 'kay?"), and how even though she agreed to being his friend again, she refuses to get back together with him. I simply hummed along and nodded with everything he said, sympathizing with my own experiences with my ex (I still baffle myself at the fact that I dated a girl once before). We talked about a lot of things that night that it's all become a blur for me; how I'd love it if he actually took the time to learn Spanish (he's Dominican), our plans for graduation and the 4 years of college ahead of us, and laughing over this one spam call he got, with the guy on the other end doing a really fucking bad impersonation of a girl voice. There was an ad for this movie Ezra Miller was in, and he started telling me how even though he was straight, he'd love to "kiss him, because he found him cute." I didn't really see the appeal.

I remember feeling stagnant, going along with whatever tangent he was currently on about. I couldn't work up the courage to make any sort of advance onto him, but it was all I was thinking about the whole time. The situation couldn't have been any more perfect; just me and him in a hotel room, alone together. I could've confessed my feelings to him, to let him know just how badly I would give up everything for him to love me back. I could've gotten up, forced myself into his bed, and sleep with him. I could've kissed him, held him and touch him the way I so desperately wanted to. It was like I wanted him to fuck me, because I was so willing to let him be the one who took my v-card away. I would have let him do anything to me that night. But I think he was slightly inebriated, and I relented from doing anything. It was probably two in the morning by time we fell asleep.

"Goodnight," was all I said, as I turned my body away from him.

---

It's just that we're worlds apart. I don't like his friends, everyone he chooses to surround himself with. I can be so blinded by love to desire him, desire me being in a relationship with him, but I know that dating someone like him, as laidback and ignorant as he can be, would fucking destroy me. I know he's straight, and while he can humor my subtle attempts all he wants, I know that a straight guy like him will never come to love me back. So, whatever.

We seldom talk now. We're still friends, sure, but there's no point in saying anything else about him; there isn't.

TL;DR
Uhmmmm, so yeah. This book destroyed me, and it reinforces the idea for me that men are evil. Now, if only I wasn't insulting myself by saying that. 5.0/5.0

[Richard Derus]

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Francis King's 1970 novel A Domestic Animal is the story of Antonio Valli, a brilliant young Italian philosopher, who arrives to do a year's research at a well-to-do university. He lodges with Dick Thompson, a successful middle-aged novelist, and his good looks and impulsive yet immensely likeable character soon have Dick captivated.

Valli is someone who needs to be admired and loved and has an insatiable craving for attention from everyone he meets; he needs an audience to perform to and he finds this at the university, but especially in Dick's company. It is not long before Dick Thompson has fallen completely in love with his charming—but very heterosexual—lodger.

What follows is an ill-fated relationship that can only end in disaster, but in A Domestic Animal King has created a novel of bitter longing and painful complexities.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Is it easier to fall in love with someone who can't return your feelings, or someone who won't? Unlike the girl who doesn't love you back, Dick Thompson's love object Antonio Valli can't reciprocate his feelings...Antonio Valli is a straight man.

This is how the story frames its unhappy ending, or at the most charitable of my responses, its bittersweet ending: A straight man with a very intense psychological need to seduce and captivate those he's identified as powerful chooses a gay man whose lust is barely concealed to ensorcel. It was written in the 1960s, so this was pretty advanced stuff. Dick Thompson is not presented as sick,or weird, or as a pervert. He's simply made a bad bet on a man...everyone can relate to that.

Nowadays we'd call Dick Thompson "sapiosexual" and Antonio Valli a "queerbaiter". I suspect that, in a novel written on this model in 2026, Antonio would be heteroflexible if only to cement his conquest of Dick. It is a conquest, a thoroughly (though not consciously, I think) intentional act of subjugation for the purposes of the conqueror's ego gratification.

Antonio Valli is an unapologetic bounder...fucks Pam, a loud, vulgar woman despite pretending (in my opinion it's a pretense) not to know how much this hurts his inappropriately-but-consensually emotionally attached host Dick Thompson, despite being married and having a family with the wife left in Italy. He is fully in control of Dick Thompson's emotions. Only when Dick Thompson dares to display some liveliness of spirit in an indirect calling-out of his caddish behavior towards both women does Antonio Valli deign to treat Dick Thompson's feelings as real, as something not deliberately evoked as part of his power-play, his ownership of Dick Thompson's feelings.

Dick Thompson is utterly besotted by Antonio Valli in so many ways. He's queer, knows he's queer, but does nothing to approach sexual activity with Antonio Valli because, in that time, bottoms like women waited to be approached or risked serious consequences...physical, reputational, emotional. Dick Thompson revels in his emotional subjugation for the same reason submissives everywhere enter into Dom/sub relationships: I'll let you hurt me if you'll really choose me, own me, care for me. If this book was ever filmed it would have to be made like Pillion , an exploration of the consuming need some people have to be the full focus of another's attention. It is a deep, and from what I know about it, life-long need that finds a way to get met that can change over time...but is never satisfied. That fact is never clearer than in the ending of this novel.

Antonio Valli, in his lordly disdain for anything not immediately satisfying to his own clawing desperation to be central to the life of someone he actually admires, chooses Pam over Dick as his bedmate...but never lets Dick off his emotional hook, or allows Pam to be more than a sexual obsession. He is a man of his time, the kind we all hope is disappearing: the thoughtless user, convinced he should be able to do just as he likes and you should do just as he likes as well. It was the privilege of maleness at that time. I suspect that 1970 readers of this novel really didn't interrogate that Antonio Valli was perfectly ordinary, at least until they were confronted by Dick Thompson's emotional responses to his arrogance.

Has all that much changed? Heavens yes. Has it changed for the better? Mixed bag on that one. As a member of Dick Thompson's native minority, I'll say mostly yes on his behalf. One thing that's changed is the desuetude of the unrequited love/unhappy ending novel. I think the point of this story stands out in relief against that uglier truth of the ending: Men loving each other the way Ralph and Mervyn do can exist, men can and do fall in love with each other (even relentlessly heterosexual ones), and gay love is fraught, complicated, and very much as interesting as cishet love.

Lest y'all think Francis King was simply talking about the subject, know that he was my fellow AIDS widower. He, much like Dick Thompson, led a quietly queer life in a time where this could easily have led him onto nasty legal troubles à la Alan Turing. I suspect but cannot prove that Pam, Antonio Valli's object of sexual obsession, was modeled after King's friend Anne Cumming (albeit unflatteringly). King was not exoticizing or fetishizing his straight man in love with a man he had no desire to fuck. He was most likely discussing his own life in too-thinly veiled terms.

Brave of him. A major step towards accurate representation of gay life in the days before liberation began. Still not that great, it's centering desire for a cishet man, but definitely honest and in its day quite positive.

[josé]

what a read. king writes about unrequited love in a such a chilling and compelling form. it was easy to become absorbed by the love affairs, the jealousy, and madness felt by thompson - king delivers these emotions + themes through his outstanding prose. in other words, king writes each sentence as though he were writing the yearners guide to yearning.

spoilers(ish):

now, speaking freely: thompson, wishing u well but pull it together, now! antonio, bruh- i dont even know what to say to u but hoping ur wife sees what a horrible and evil person u are. pam, girl, ur lowkey evil and by lowkey i mean highkey. also the section where antonio talks about gay couples living together being “ridiculous” while carrying out an affair was unbelievable (but not really ig) - anyway that was the one part where i cheered thompson on, keep him in check!!!!

great read, recommend to all!

5/5