During a surreal, illusory period of my life, I was a recluse in an eighteenth century apartment above Rose Crescent. It was a strange time mentally; following the passing away of my grandfather, I didn’t fit into the university anymore if I ever did in the first place. I lived right above the infamous Gardenia; its schedule became my schedule, rendering me a quasi-Quasimodo in my bell tower, a nocturnal entity. Clouded in a haze of cigarette smoke illuminated by silvery moonlight, my favourite pastime became observing the river of humanity continuously flowing through the limestone crescent. People at all stages of life and social status passed along its current, their presence echoing throughout this stone tunnel. It was a cacophony, a symphony of booze; every night, a mixture of townies, gownies and Essex folk would migrate from the clubs and pubs to indulge in the greasy slops served here on Rose Crescent. Be it a quick ‘mackies’ at midnight or an infernal, stomach-altering ‘gardies’ at 4am, my street was a feeding ground, a greasy trough, and I was pleasantly stationed in the Royal Box, no Opera Glasses required.
The endless noise, the screaming, laughing and garbled drunken singing kept me up at night, so much so that I would awake in the late afternoon and fall asleep at dawn. My metamorphosis was fast and ruthless; I became as nocturnal as the foxes that would wander the street, looking for half-masticated, discarded burgers a mere half-hour after the closing of Gardies. At the same time, I was as ethereal and out-of-place as the armies of ducks who would waddle the crescent in the sleeping hours, intermittently launching their bills into cheesy chips like bayonets. This experience was truly fascinating, and has influenced my art and outlook considerably; I have many stories to share.
As Rose Crescent was ordained a pilgrimage site by the Catholiquor Church, it would be subjected to a guaranteed stream of pilgrims every night through until sunrise. Among the pilgrims came many homeless people each night, hoping somebody might buy them a much-needed meal; in that time, I had many conversations with homeless individuals. I learned so much, and am deeply grateful for each interaction. There were also seedy opportunists attracted to the insalubrious street; far too often, I would watch morally dubious ‘pickup artists’, for example, preying upon drunken women, or pugnacious roid-heads desperately bursting for an altercation. Luckily, they were never successful; the street being so busy, thanks to the eyes of police, Christian missionaries, bouncers from La Raza (another source of unending, throbbing night-noise) and the more sober of pilgrims, made Rose Crescent quite safe despite the chaos.
I have so many stories, from jamming with homeless musicians at daybreak whilst taking Jimi Hendrix requests from drunk Americans, to the distressing scene of watching ‘philanthropists’ profusely pet and buy kebabs for a homeless dog whilst actively ignoring his owner, to watching an extremely inebriated girl fall and hit her head so forcefully that the bang rang out like a dropped water bottle in this limestone reverb chamber (a sound I’ll never forget), to seeing a ‘dead man’ out my window at 6am who turned out to be so intoxicated that he was lying face down, paralytic, right below me on the street (though, luckily he was very much alive, resulting in me calling him an ambulance whilst trying to keep him awake). There are so, so many more stories. But, today, I choose to share a very particular story due to a strange kinship I found in the moment, observing from my window through a shroud of cigarette smoke.
Midnight, Rose Crescent. The street is becoming busy, the town is loud and bustling with the rhythm of a low quality clubbing experience and the students whom it is appropriately budgeted for. I am in my bed, probably watching YouTube or noodling on my telecaster, unplugged. The windows are open; waft after waft of the unhealthiest yet most alluring food clouds pass through, intermingled with cigarette smoke from below. Much like my anosmia to these routine wafts of ‘Eau de Rose Crescent’, the unending chattering and bantering of the infinite scroll of strangers all around is also rendered unheard by my jaded ears. However, this is all interrupted very suddenly with a reverberating, booming male scream. A growling, grimaced ‘AaAaAaAaghh!’
Intrigued, I assume my seat at the window, my watchtower, tantalised by my amoral calling to simply ‘observe’. A dishevelled man in equally dishevelled clothing is darting erratically in the street from side to side; desperate citizens clear his way, pretending he isn’t there. But he is there and, whilst he is loud, he still maintains somewhat of his own civility by keeping his internal state within his personal space. Clearly under the influence of a cocktail of various substances, he staggers and sprints, all the while clutching a deep green wine bottle in his right fist. It glows and refracts the warm, yellow-tinted street lamps. This does not go on for long. In the midst of his haphazard, scattered gait, he pauses at a distinct spot between La Raza and McDonalds (probably opposite the baby shop, if I remember correctly). In a Shakespearian manner, he sinks to his knees on the cold, limestone cobbles. He lifts his hands in the air, the wine bottle in his right hand. Gesturing with the bottle, he points firmly at the low full moon, a buttercream orb suspended in the velvet blue night sky and screams. He screams absurd curses at it, ‘f*** you!’ repeatedly, all the while pointing and aggressively kneeling.
Onlookers desperately scramble away from this lived moment of human tragedy. It is too much for them; dangerous. From my window, I watch. The ritual now complete, the man rises from his knees. He smashes the empty bottle on the ground and heads towards the market, disappearing into the night. I will never see him again.
This stuck with me. As a music student, I was very familiar with Schoenberg’s deeply important early atonal work, Pierrot Lunaire (1912). Whilst it has never been music I have liked or have even understood despite studying it multiple times, it popped into my mind during this moment. I had at times pondered upon the Pierrot archetype, and in general was rather fascinated by the somewhat Romantic vision of a sad, disenfranchised clown, an unrecognised artist and lover. Sometimes, I even thought of myself as a Pierrot in a gown. However, I had never truly ‘felt’ it until this event took place.
The first movement, Mondestrunken, was the specific part of the music that was playing in my mind; I was indeed witnessing a man utterly captivated by the moon. He was not drunk on moonlight; rather, on other methods. Moreover, he was not in love with the moon, but seemingly ‘in hate’ with it. The composition behind the Mondestrunken libretto is intense; a winding, spidery invention of plucky sounds behind the yawning of a seemingly indifferent flute and the aggressive snarlings of strings; all is bound together by the unsettling Sprechstimme uttering the equally unsettling libretto, which one can read here:
https://oxfordsong.org/song/mondestrunken
I believe Schoenberg begins this work with an immediate unwinding of the safety-net of sanity, and perhaps that is one reason why in that moment, witnessing a man raging at the moon, Mondestrunken came to mind. Moreover, the imagery of moonlight as wine being imbibed through our eyes became very apparent. It harks back to an archaic idea of lunacy; madness being engendered into a frenzy by the presence of moonlight.
At the same time, I was trying not to intellectualise the very raw, human tragic element of this. I was witnessing a man at an extremely low point; I was witnessing him. Not judging or condemning, neither praising nor glorifying, or anything in between the poles of interpretation; just witnessing. I wasn’t exactly at a high point myself either during this time, if anything quite the opposite. As a result, I felt a strange kinship with this ‘lunatic’, and I recognised something of myself in his behaviour. Though I had no intention of cursing the moon, I did have this strong urge to curse something. Myself? My peers? My elders? A rebellious spirit within me wished to lash out, to make itself heard and seen, to release the shackles which, in time, I came to discover were very much self-imposed.
I was also reminded of my kinship with the night in general. Its quietude, mystery and the mask of identity it provides in its darkness, its solitude and its inaccessibility: all are qualities that I revere in it. In Cambridge, I have always found comfort in its shadow; in that year, 2018, I spent more time in the shadow than outside of it. In contrast, life is completely different nowadays, yet I do continue to explore the shadows of Cambridge to this day; night continues to be my preferred state when walking those streets.
In darkness, the limestone of history is gently painted in strokes of warm tones by buzzing street lamps and speckled with neon glow; it all diffuses into the anonymity of black-blue skies like an Alka-Seltzer fizzes away into the obscurity of a glass of water. The streets are quiet and elusive, despite localised pockets being crowded with the drunken and merry. Pretensions evaporate into the ether, punting is a dicey, cold game and tour guides and their crowds sleep in hotels. The river cam slinks through the middle like a black cat reclined on the edge of its sofa, its fur catching the moon like silver dew on the morning grass. The ghosts haunt those who fear them, but walk amicably beside those who know them. Cambridge is at its most peaceful, however, when night begins to fade into day, just before the sun has truly risen; specifically, during the summer months at approximately 5am. The empty void of the streets is incomparable; a sleeping world beheld by the eyes of the nocturnal.
With this garnish of context, I shall now share some of my favourite black and white film photographs of Cambridge by night from recent months. I will simply ‘title’ them; no more, for enough words have been expressed already. Thank you very much for reading
Yours sincerely,
Harry
51
Town & Gown
Under the Shadow of Night
The Realm of Mannequins
Trio in Shadow
A Mutual Distrust
Mondenstrunken
The Night Watch
The Old Way Passing The New
Reflection on Petty Cury
A Reveling Stupor
Saxophone
When the Tourists Sleep
Another Protest
The Garish New Guardian of the Crescent
Replacement & Refurbishment
The Old Leather Shop
A Beautiful Song
The Veil of Palms
Arjuna’s Questions of the Universe
The Watering Hole
Everyman
“I Thought I’d Ruined It“
King’s Parade, Dissolving Into the Blue-Black
Nowhere Else But Cambridge
Rage in the Mist
Graduation In The Spirit Realm
Beneath the Scaffolds
A Green Street Affair
Cheese Shopping at Midnight
The Golden Calf
Seat at the Table
Perspective of a City Fox
Chinese Canteen
A Strange Idea
Trinity Street, Subsumed by Darkness
These images were all taken between January and February of 2026, on a mixture of Kentmere 400 and Kodak T-max 400, all pushed 3 or 4 stops. This was what I would do after work, between buses; hunt for illusions, shadows and unique moments in the biting winter cold. They all symbolise a life-long love of Cambridge Nights and a growing confidence in my black and white photography abilities. In themselves, they represent another challenging, slightly surreal period in my life, which I may go into in a future article. For now though, I leave you with an image of a man, intoxicated with the comforts of Cambridge nights…
Harry's Photography Thoughts 
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