On Knut Hamsun’s
Hunger
(excerpt)

DON WATERS

In my early twenties, I was introduced to the Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun by way of Paul Auster. Auster had just published Hand to Mouth, a memoir about struggling to scratch out a meager existence in his twenties while trying to write. I was in a similar situation, and I devoured his book. Not long after, at my local bookstore, I came across Hamsun’s Hunger, published in 1890. I’d never heard of the man or the novel. But I was drawn to the book because Auster had written the introduction, saying, “Something new is happening here, some new thought about the nature of art is being proposed in Hunger.”

Back in my apartment, I read the opening paragraph: “All of this happened while I was walking around starving in Christiania— that strange city no one escapes from until it has left its mark on him. . .” I finished the book that night, astounded by its ferocity, language, and now-ness. The book could have been published the day before. Here was a hundred-year-old novel that felt contemporary and true. Of course, my own “hand-to-mouth” way of life colored my initial interpretation of the book: I believed that it was a testament to the struggling artist in a world unkind to artists.

Here is what happens: An unnamed narrator living in Christiania—now Oslo— spends large parts of his days sitting in church cemeteries, walking the streets, and searching for ways to survive. Our narrator is so poor that “[he] didn’t even have a comb left, or a book to read when [he] felt hopeless.” His possessions are so few that he only has “a few dozens sheets of paper,” a pencil, and his mind, which erodes due to starvation. Unable to secure a job, he tries to write articles for the Morning Times, hoping to earn enough money to survive a while longer. Exceedingly hungry, he places wood shavings in his mouth to ward off pangs; once, he tries biting off his finger. One would think all of this would elicit sympathy, but sympathizing with Hamsun’s narrator is difficult. He makes proclamations that he’s better than the society in which he lives. His desire to appear respectable is so great that he stubbornly refuses money that will feed him. He refers to his fellow citizens as “creatures.” He is ashamed by his poverty, and he is spellbound by it.

The narrator never apologizes for his ranting or lying; in fact, he draws pleasure from avoiding the truth. He is shown as he is: his hair falling out, debating whether to pawn the buttons on his coat, talking to himself in bursts of near-madness. Just when we believe he might die or lose his mind from hunger, an article gets accepted at the paper, a grocer accidentally gives him money, and suddenly a week goes by “in joy and gladness.” He continues to write (“I had three or four essays in the works”), but soon enough he runs out of money again, his suffering continues as before, and in the end he boards a ship in the harbor and leaves Christiania behind.