The starlings have gone mad

Today marks the 16th anniversary of the publication of The Death of Bunny Munro - Nick Cave’s darkly comic novel partly set in Brighton. One particular passage focuses on the burning down of the West Pier.

Cave, an Australian singer, songwriter, novelist and screenwriter, has been closely associated with Brighton since the early 2000s. Having lived for years in Hove with his wife Susie Bick and their children, Cave was often seen around the city and became a familiar if sometimes reclusive presence. 

Brighton has figured in both his music and his fiction: he wrote and recorded albums here, and its seafront and piers became woven into The Death of Bunny Munro. His time in the city was also marked by personal tragedy, most notably the death of his son Arthur in 2015, after which Cave and his family later relocated to London and Los Angeles.

The Death of Bunny Munro, published on 8 September 2009, follows the disintegrating life of a Brighton-based door-to-door cosmetics salesman. Bunny, a compulsive womaniser and alcoholic, is left to care for his young son after his wife’s suicide. As he spirals into chaos, his grotesque behaviour and addictions clash with moments of tenderness toward his child. The novel mixes bleak comedy, surreal imagery and local detail, casting Brighton in a lurid and unsettling light. Here is one extract from the book.

Bunny . . . says, ‘Libby, baby, where do we live?’

‘Brighton.’

‘And where is Brighton?’ he says, running a finger along the row of miniature bottles of liquor arranged on the bedside table and choosing a Smirnoff.

‘Down south.’

‘Which is about as far away from “up north” as you can get without falling into the bloody sea. Now, sweetie, turn off the TV, take your Tegretol, take a sleeping tablet—shit, take two sleeping tablets—and I’ll be back tomorrow. Early.’

‘The pier is burning down,’ says Libby.

‘What?’

‘The West Pier, it’s burning down. I can smell the smoke from here.’

‘The West Pier?’

Bunny empties the tiny bottle of vodka down his throat, lights another cigarette, and rises from the bed. The room heaves as Bunny is hit by the realisation that he is very drunk. With arms held out to the side and on tiptoe, Bunny moonwalks across the room to the window. He lurches, stumbles and Tarzans the faded chintz curtains until he finds his balance and steadies himself. He draws them open extravagantly and vulcanised daylight and the screaming of birds deranges the room. Bunny’s pupils contract painfully as he grimaces through the window, into the light. He sees a dark cloud of starlings, twittering madly over the flaming, smoking hulk of the West Pier that stands, helpless, in the sea across from the hotel. He wonders why he hadn’t seen this before and then wonders how long he has been in this room, then remembers his wife and hears her say, ‘Bunny, are you there?’

‘Yeah,’ says Bunny, transfixed by the sight of the burning pier and the thousand screaming birds.

‘The starlings have gone mad. It’s such a horrible thing. Their little babies burning in their nests. I can’t bear it, Bun,’ says Libby, the high violin rising.

The photograph of the West Pier above is credited to Terry Applin and can be found at The Argus.