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Hunger (novel)
Encyclopedia
Hunger is a novel by the Norwegian
author Knut Hamsun
and was published in its final form in 1890. Parts of it had been published anonymously in the Danish
magazine Ny Jord in 1888. The novel has been hailed as the literary opening of the 20th century and an outstanding example of modern, psychology-driven literature. It hails the irrationality of the human mind in an intriguing and sometimes humorous novel. It has been translated into English three times: in 1899 by Mary Chavelita Dunne (under the alias George Egerton
), by Robert Bly
in 1967, and in 1996 by Sverre Lyngstad, whose translation is considered definitive.
Written after Hamsun's return from an ill-fated tour of America, Hunger is loosely based on the author's own impoverished life before his breakthrough in 1890. Set in late 19th century Kristiania
, the novel recounts the adventures of a starving young man whose sense of reality is giving way to a delusionary existence on the darker side of a modern metropolis. While he vainly tries to maintain an outer shell of respectability, his mental and physical decay are recounted in detail. His ordeal, enhanced by his inability or unwillingness to pursue a professional career, which he deems unfit for someone of his abilities, is pictured in a series of encounters which Hamsun himself described as 'a series of analyses.' In many ways, the protagonist of the novel displays traits reminiscent of Raskolnikov, whose creator, Fyodor Dostoevsky
, was one of Hamsun's main influences. The influence of naturalist
authors such as Emile Zola
is apparent in the novel, as is his rejection of the realist
tradition.
Hunger encompasses two of Hamsun's literary and ideological leitmotif
s:
's capital in pursuit of nourishment. It is clear from the opening chapter he is mentally unstable, accosting women on the street with strange behavior, yet physically he is healthy. Over four episodes he meets a number of more or less mysterious persons, the most notable being Ylajali, a young woman with whom he has a semi-sexual encounter. This woman haunts him and he attempts to refind her to no avail. He has a self-created code of chivalry, giving money and clothes to needy children and vagrants, not eating food given to him out of respect for their kindness, and turning himself in for stealing. Essentially self-destructive, he thus falls into traps of his own making, and with a lack of food, warmth and basic comfort, his body turns slowly to ruin. Overwhelmed by hunger, he scrounges for meals, at one point nearly eating his own (rather precious) pencil. His social, physical and mental state are in constant decline. However, he has no antagonistic feelings towards 'society' as such, rather he blames his fate on 'God' or a divine world order. He vows not to succumb to this order and remains 'a foreigner in life', haunted by 'nervousness, by irrational details'. He experiences a major artistic and financial triumph when he sells a text to a newspaper, but despite this he finds writing increasingly difficult due to the lack of food - he can't write without food, and can't eat without writing. At one point in the story, he asks to spend a night in a prison cell, fooling the police into believing that he is a well-to-do journalist who has lost the keys to his apartment; in the morning he can't bring himself to reveal his poverty, even to partake in the free breakfast they provide the homeless, since this would bring their attention to the fact that he'd lied about his identity and would land him in further troubles. Finally as the book comes to close, when his existence is at an absolute ebb, he signs on to the crew of a ship leaving the city.
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
author Knut Hamsun
Knut Hamsun
Knut Hamsun was a Norwegian author, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920. He was praised by King Haakon VII of Norway as Norway's soul....
and was published in its final form in 1890. Parts of it had been published anonymously in the Danish
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
magazine Ny Jord in 1888. The novel has been hailed as the literary opening of the 20th century and an outstanding example of modern, psychology-driven literature. It hails the irrationality of the human mind in an intriguing and sometimes humorous novel. It has been translated into English three times: in 1899 by Mary Chavelita Dunne (under the alias George Egerton
George Egerton
Mary Chavelita Dunne Bright , better known by her pen name George Egerton, was a "New Woman" writer and feminist. Widely considered to be one of the most important of the "New Woman" writers of the nineteenth century fin de siecle, she was a friend of George Bernard Shaw, Ellen Terry and J. M...
), by Robert Bly
Robert Bly
Robert Bly is an American poet, author, activist and leader of the Mythopoetic Men's Movement.-Life:Bly was born in Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota, to Jacob and Alice Bly, who were of Norwegian ancestry. Following graduation from high school in 1944, he enlisted in the United States Navy, serving...
in 1967, and in 1996 by Sverre Lyngstad, whose translation is considered definitive.
Written after Hamsun's return from an ill-fated tour of America, Hunger is loosely based on the author's own impoverished life before his breakthrough in 1890. Set in late 19th century Kristiania
Oslo
Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
, the novel recounts the adventures of a starving young man whose sense of reality is giving way to a delusionary existence on the darker side of a modern metropolis. While he vainly tries to maintain an outer shell of respectability, his mental and physical decay are recounted in detail. His ordeal, enhanced by his inability or unwillingness to pursue a professional career, which he deems unfit for someone of his abilities, is pictured in a series of encounters which Hamsun himself described as 'a series of analyses.' In many ways, the protagonist of the novel displays traits reminiscent of Raskolnikov, whose creator, Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....
, was one of Hamsun's main influences. The influence of naturalist
Naturalism (literature)
Naturalism was a literary movement taking place from the 1880s to 1940s that used detailed realism to suggest that social conditions, heredity, and environment had inescapable force in shaping human character...
authors such as Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
is apparent in the novel, as is his rejection of the realist
Literary realism
Literary realism most often refers to the trend, beginning with certain works of nineteenth-century French literature and extending to late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century authors in various countries, towards depictions of contemporary life and society "as they were." In the spirit of...
tradition.
Hunger encompasses two of Hamsun's literary and ideological leitmotif
Leitmotif
A leitmotif , sometimes written leit-motif, is a musical term , referring to a recurring theme, associated with a particular person, place, or idea. It is closely related to the musical idea of idée fixe...
s:
- His insistence that the intricacies of the human mind ought to be the main object of modern literature. Hamsun's own literary program, to describe 'the whisper of the blood and the pleading of the bone marrow', is thoroughly manifest in Hunger.
- His depreciation of modern, urban civilization. In the famous opening lines of the novel, he ambiguously describes KristianiaOsloOslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
as 'this wondrous city that no one leaves before it has made its marks upon him.' The latter is counterbalanced in other of Hamsun's works such as MysteriesMysteries (novel)Mysteries is a novel by Norwegian author Knut Hamsun.-Plot introduction:In this intensely psychological Modernist novel, the community of a small Norwegian coastal town is "[shaken]" by the arrival of eccentric stranger Johan Nagel...
(Mysterier) (1892) and Growth of the SoilGrowth of the SoilThe Growth of the Soil is the novel by Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun which won him the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920.-Theme:...
(Markens Grøde), which earned him the Nobel prize in literatureNobel Prize in LiteratureSince 1901, the Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded annually to an author from any country who has, in the words from the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction"...
but also a reputation for being a proto-National SocialistNazismNazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
Blut und Boden author.
Plot summary
The novel's first-person protagonist, an unnamed vagrant with intellectual leanings, probably in his late twenties, wanders the streets of NorwayNorway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
's capital in pursuit of nourishment. It is clear from the opening chapter he is mentally unstable, accosting women on the street with strange behavior, yet physically he is healthy. Over four episodes he meets a number of more or less mysterious persons, the most notable being Ylajali, a young woman with whom he has a semi-sexual encounter. This woman haunts him and he attempts to refind her to no avail. He has a self-created code of chivalry, giving money and clothes to needy children and vagrants, not eating food given to him out of respect for their kindness, and turning himself in for stealing. Essentially self-destructive, he thus falls into traps of his own making, and with a lack of food, warmth and basic comfort, his body turns slowly to ruin. Overwhelmed by hunger, he scrounges for meals, at one point nearly eating his own (rather precious) pencil. His social, physical and mental state are in constant decline. However, he has no antagonistic feelings towards 'society' as such, rather he blames his fate on 'God' or a divine world order. He vows not to succumb to this order and remains 'a foreigner in life', haunted by 'nervousness, by irrational details'. He experiences a major artistic and financial triumph when he sells a text to a newspaper, but despite this he finds writing increasingly difficult due to the lack of food - he can't write without food, and can't eat without writing. At one point in the story, he asks to spend a night in a prison cell, fooling the police into believing that he is a well-to-do journalist who has lost the keys to his apartment; in the morning he can't bring himself to reveal his poverty, even to partake in the free breakfast they provide the homeless, since this would bring their attention to the fact that he'd lied about his identity and would land him in further troubles. Finally as the book comes to close, when his existence is at an absolute ebb, he signs on to the crew of a ship leaving the city.
Screen versions
Two films have been made based upon the novel Hunger.- HungerHunger (2001 film)Hunger is a 2001 film written and directed by Maria Giese, based upon the 1890 novel of the same title by Norwegian author Knut Hamsun....
(2001), directed by Maria GieseMaria GieseMaria Giese is an American film director and screenwriter. She has a bachelor's degree from Wellesley College and a Masters of Fine Arts in film directing from the University of California, Los Angeles's Graduate School of Film & Technology. While at UCLA, she produced the student film A Dry Heat,... - HungerHunger (1966 film)Hunger , is a 1966 black-and-white drama film directed by Denmark's Henning Carlsen, starring Swedish actor Per Oscarsson, and based upon the novel Hunger by Norwegian Nobel Prize-winning author Knut Hamsun...
(1966), directed by Henning CarlsenHenning CarlsenHenning Carlsen is a Danish film director, screenwriter, and producer most noted for his documentaries and his contributions to the style of Cinéma vérité. Carlsen's 1966 social-realistic drama Hunger was nominated for the Palme D'Or and won the Bodil Award for Best Danish Film...
External links
- Hunger at Internet ArchiveInternet ArchiveThe Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...
, LibriVoxLibriVoxLibriVox is an online digital library of free public domain audiobooks, read by volunteers and is probably, since 2007, the world's most prolific audiobook publisher...
, Google Books and Project GutenbergProject GutenbergProject Gutenberg is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks". Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, it is the oldest digital library. Most of the items in its collection are the full texts of public domain books...
(audiobooks, scanned books, plain text)