Like a Cat Loves a Bird: The Nine Lives of Muriel Spark

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Like a Cat Loves a Bird

by
James Bailey

general information | review summaries | our review | links | about the author

Title:	Like a Cat Loves a Bird
Author:	James Bailey
Genre:	Biography
Written:	2026
Length:	240 pages
Availability:	Like a Cat Loves a Bird - US
	Like a Cat Loves a Bird - UK
	Like a Cat Loves a Bird - Canada

	from: Bookshop.org (US)

The Nine Lives of Muriel Spark

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Our Assessment:

B+ : enjoyable and insightful literary-life study

See our review for fuller assessment.

Review Summaries
Source	Rating	Date	Reviewer
Daily Mail	.	17/5/2026	Y.M.Graham
The Scotsman	.	2/4/2026	David Robinson
The Times	.	2/4/2026	Paula Byrne

From the Reviews:

"Reading James Bailey’s incisive book on ‘the nine lives’ of the feline, elusive and emotionally slippery Muriel Spark, I was reminded just how creepy her novels are -- and also what a strange, cold person she was. I didn’t warm to her one bit (.....) Bailey takes us through the ‘nine lives’ of Spark, painting memorable vignettes of her changing and secretive ways of living." - Ysenda Maxtone Graham, Daily Mail

Please note that these ratings solely represent the complete review's biased interpretation and subjective opinion of the actual reviews and do not claim to accurately reflect or represent the views of the reviewers. Similarly the illustrative quotes chosen here are merely those the complete review subjectively believes represent the tenor and judgment of the review as a whole. We acknowledge (and remind and warn you) that they may, in fact, be entirely unrepresentative of the actual reviews by any other measure.

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The complete review's Review:

Muriel Spark wrote an autobiography -- Curriculum Vitae (1992) -- and Martin Stannard published Muriel Spark: The Biography in 2009; James Bailey acknowledges that Stannard's: "painstakingly researched biography provided me with a roadmap of Spark's life" and that he relied on it extensively, but his own book, while retracing much of Spark's life and work, is a rather different sort of take on the author -- reflecting what he sees as "this lifelong slipperiness, this sense of perpetual reinvention" to Spark's life: where we find that instead of: "a whole, definitive story, then, we have a number of short, partial ones".
The clever title is taken from an interview, Bailey explaining:

An interviewer had asked her about the cruelty and violence she inflicts so frequently upon her characters in her novels. Does she hate them ? 'Oh no, I love them most intensely,' Spark replied, 'like a cat loves a bird. You know cats do love birds. They love to fondle them.'

       (In his Acknowledgements Bailey mentions some of the other titles he considered -- and, as he admits, they were ... not good.)
       In his Prologue, Bailey allows that, after all: "As is fitting for someone who favoured the company of cats, she appeared to have nine lives. Or ten, twelve, fourteen; one can't be too prescriptive, where Spark is concerned" -- and so he isn't, not actually presenting his book divided into nine chapters, as the subtitle might have suggested. And, while basically tracing Spark's life and career chronologically, Like a Cat Loves a Bird doesn't simply unspool in one steady flow; instead, each chapter has a more specific focus, with much of the in-between only glancingly addressed. Especially regarding the personal relationships, the gaps are sometimes big: Spark's complicated relationship with son Robin pops up repeatedly but he remains a distant figure (arguably appropriately so, since she was never much of a proximate mother), while friendships such as that with Christine Brooke-Rose are tantalizingly mentioned but never described in much detail.
       Spark's impressive and long literary career is quite well-presented, though parts don't get the attention they might -- such as her very early efforts and success as a poet (though her brief, tumultuous tenure then as The Poetry Society's general secretary and editor of the Poetry Review is nicely covered). But Bailey is very good on many of the novels, especially in providing the context of their writing and going back to the drafts and other supporting material -- noting how much material Spark collected in preparation for each work, and how various bits of that found their way into her fiction (with Spark's archive a remarkably through and extensive one).
       The different stations of her life -- notably: Rhodesia, London, Rome, New York -- with an office at The New Yorker --, and, finally, with Penelope Jardine, San Giovanni -- make for fascinating contrasts; one might wish for more detail (and gossip), but Bailey gives a good general impression of these stages and places in Spark's life and career, and how she managed each (always devoted to her writing). Discussion of matters such as Spark's adoption of Catholicism, or the effect the Eichmann trial -- she was there in person for some of it -- had on her, are also of interest.
       Bailey does insert himself and his own reactions in the telling -- from (understandable) doubts about how credible some of Spark's claims are ("I do not, you see, quite trust Spark's version of events") to the outright visceral (e.g. "I have never quite managed to shake off the clammy, intensely claustrophobic sensation produced by the final pages of The Girls of Slender Means", or: "Writing those words sends a shiver down my back"). It seems the trend nowadays in literary-critical writing, and can serve a purpose; in any case, it doesn't extend too far and deep here, but readers' tolerance for this sort of thing this presumably varies (and, yes, a swing of the pendulum towards the other, entirely impersonal extreme wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, methinks ...).
       Spark certainly comes across as a fascinating -- if also in many respects difficult, and not particularly pleasant -- person in Like a Cat Loves a Bird. Even as she remains elusive -- her life, as Bailey notes, was a: "wildly varied" one -- Bailey captures much of what there is to capture -- especially her obsession with writing, as well as the amazing variety of her work.
       Like a Cat Loves a Bird is an enjoyable read -- commendable also for not wearing out its welcome, as it comes in at a very manageable length -- and a very good literary-life study, providing useful and interesting insights for those familiar with Spark's work -- and surely tempting readers not familiar with some or all of it to dip in.

- M.A.Orthofer, 3 June 2026

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Links:

Like a Cat Loves a Bird:

Princeton University Press publicity page
Sceptre publicity page
Information page at CAA

Reviews:

James Bailey:

James Bailey at CAA

Muriel Spark:

Muriel Spark at British Council Literature
Muriel Spark Archive at the National Library of Scotland

Books by Muriel Spark under review:

Other books of interest under review:

See Index of Biographical works under review

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About the Author:

James Bailey is an English writer and researcher.

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