Barry Hines obituary: author of A Kestrel for a Knave

Novelist and screenwriter whose most famous book, A Kestrel for a Knave, was turned into the 1969 film Kes

Barry Hines, who has died aged 76, wrote about working-class lives for more than 40 years and, while the results were sometimes gloomy (reality often is), he kept an eye for the decency and hope in people. In his most famous book, A Kestrel for a Knave (1968) – filmed as Kes a year later by Ken Loach – Barry forged the emblem of a ragged generation, Billy Casper.

Everyone knew a Casper: half-boy, half-pigeon, disowned by his family and school, left to shuffle through life in a 10-bob anorak and half-mast trousers. The book’s inclusion on school syllabuses meant it became embedded in the psyche of British cultural life. Almost everyone is aware of Kes, if not of its author, and many adults of a certain age claim it as one of the few books they have read.

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