The Bird of Night Critical Essay | Critical Review by Alexander Theroux

SOURCE: "A Tale of Madness," in National Review, Vol. XXV, No. 17, April 27, 1973, p. 479.

In the review below, Theroux details the character of Francis Croft of The Bird of Night, observing Hill's "uncanny insight" about insanity.

The "greatest poet of his age," as envisioned by Susan Hill in her novel The Bird of Night, is an owlish, manic-depressive Scot named Francis Croft, aet. 33, who courts death imprisoned in the land of catatonia, an insanitarium of self where his nerve ends, always exposed, show themselves each to be more sensitive than a rice-weevil's feeler. This isn't really a novel. It's a nervous breakdown. It's a confession. Croft as a real character is totally unrealized, but, rather, thesis-wise, he's shot to us right away in an indescribable shrillness and stays that way: a casebook barmy whose eccentric and perverse behavior stands as the single sine qua non of...
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