The Midnight Feast

Lucy Foley uses the children’s song “The Teddy Bears’ Picnic” throughout the narrative as a motif for the theme of Magic as a Natural Force. The song is popular in the United Kingdom despite having “one of the most sinister sets of lyrics ever composed” (Stein, Sadue. “Picnic Time.” The Paris Review, 28 Aug. 2015). The lyricist, Irish songwriter Jimmy Kennedy, is said to have been inspired by a wooded grove near his home in Somerset. The lyrics and creepy melody resonate with the events in The Midnight Feast underscoring the menacing narrative tone: “If you go down to the woods today / You’re sure of a big surprise. / If you go down to the woods today / You’d better go in disguise!” In the text, the song is used in reference to The Birds, who meet in the woods disguised as crows, and their desire for Vigilante Justice in a Local Community.

In The Midnight Feast, Foley implies that the spooky aspects of this song and its thematic resonance motivate Francesca to play the song to scare Bella in the woods when they were teenagers.