Barry Hines: A Kestrel for a KnaveThe novel “A Kestrel for a Knave”, by Barry Hines, takes place in 1968 in an industrial area in the North. It's about a boy named Billy Casper who is under pressure at home and struggling at school. The only time he can escape is when he runs away to the countryside to discover nature in all its splendor. The title of the novel is something of a play on words, because in medieval times there existed a group of people called knaves who, like Billy in the novel, belonged to the lowest class in the world. Their bird to hunt was a kestrel, and in the novel, Billy finds a kestrel and trains it. The author, Barry Hines, uses a lot of contrast in the early stages of the story to emphasize the difference between Billy's underprivileged life and the lives of upper-class people. Billy's house is cramped, dirty, uncomfortable, and generally not a very pleasant environment for Billy to grow up in. His family is poor and Billy has to share a bed with his older brother Jud – we can tell there is a bed by the description: "The wardrobe and the bed had fuzzy shapes in the darkness." His family can't even afford curtains for the bedroom: "There were no curtains drawn up." They have no central heating and rely on fire daily for heat and light. They can barely afford to eat, as evidenced by what Billy finds in the pantry, "a packet of dried peas and half a bottle of vinegar." It's clear there's no car in their garage when it says Billy "threw an oil can the length of the garage." It's completely different from the countryside, which is clean and seems to be the place where Billy can get away from his home and school life. When Billy is out in the country in the early hours of the morning, the air takes on a "fresher, crisper quality." The way the campaign descriptions are written doesn't show any bad points.