Hunger

by Knut Hamsun

  I turn away so he won’t see I’m not wearing a vest when I open my coat, and take the manuscript from my pocket.

  “It’s just a short profile of Correggio,” I say, “but I’m afraid it may not be written in such a way that—”

  He takes the papers out of my hand and starts leafing through them. He turns his face in my direction.

  So this was how he looked close up, this man whose name I had already heard in my first youth and whose paper had had the greatest influence on me throughout the years. His hair is curly, his fine brown eyes a bit restless; he has a habit of snorting slightly every once in a while. A Scottish parson couldn’t look more gentle than this dangerous writer, whose words had always left bloody stripes wherever they struck. I am stirred by a curious feeling of fear and admiration vis-à-vis this person; on the verge of tears, I cannot help advancing a step to tell him how sincerely I loved him for all he had taught me and to ask him not to hurt me—I was only a poor devil who had a hard enough time of it as it was.

  He looked up and slowly folded my manuscript, pondering as he did so. To make it easier for him to give me a refusal, I extend my hand slightly and remark, “Oh well, you can’t use it, of course.” And I smile to give the impression I’m taking it lightly.

  “Everything we can use must be so popular,” he answers. “You know the sort of public we have. Couldn’t you try to make it a bit simpler? Or else come up with something that people understand better?”

  His tact strikes me with wonder. I realize that my article has been scrapped, but I couldn’t have received a nicer refusal. So as not to take up more of his time, I reply, “Yes, I suppose I could.”

  I walk up to the door. Hmm. He had to excuse me for taking up his time with this. . . . I bow and put my hand on the doorknob.

  “If you need it,” he says, “I would be glad to give you a small advance. You can always write for it.”

  Now that he had seen I was no good as a writer, his offer felt somewhat humiliating, and I replied, “Thank you, no, I can manage awhile yet. Thank you kindly anyway. Goodbye.”

  “Goodbye,” the “Commander” replies, turning back to his desk the same moment.

  Even so he had treated me with undeserved kindness, and I was grateful to him for that; I would know how to appreciate it, too. I decided not to come back to him until I could bring him a piece I was completely satisfied with, something that would take the “Commander” by surprise and make him order me to be paid ten kroner without a moment’s hesitation. I returned home and set about writing afresh.

  The next several evenings, as eight o’clock approached and the street lamps had already been lighted, the following happened regularly to me:

  As I come out of my entranceway in order to set out on a walk in the streets after the day’s labor and hardships, a lady dressed in black stands near the lamppost just outside the gate. Her face is turned toward me, and she follows me with her eyes as I walk past her. I notice that she is always dressed the same way, wears the same heavy veil that conceals her face and falls over her breast, and carries in her hand a small umbrella with an ivory ring in the handle.

  It was already the third evening I had seen her there, always in the very same spot. As soon as I had passed, she turned slowly and walked down the street, away from me.

  My nervous brain shot out its feelers, and I immediately had the absurd idea that her visit concerned me. In the end I was nearly on the point of accosting her, asking her if she was looking for someone, if she needed my help with something, or if I could take her home—poorly dressed though I was, regretfully—and protect her in the dark streets. But I had a vague fear it might cost me something, a glass of wine or a cab ride, and I didn’t have any money left. My hopelessly empty pockets had an all too disheartening effect on me, and I didn’t even have the courage to look closely at her as I walked past. Hunger had again begun to play havoc with me, I hadn’t had a bite to eat since last night. That certainly wasn’t a very long time, I had often been able to hold out for several days on end, but I had begun to grow alarmingly thinner. I wasn’t nearly as good at starving as I used to be; a single day could now put me into a near daze, and I suffered from constant vomiting as soon as I drank some water. Moreover, I was cold at night—sleeping in my clothes, the same I’d worn all day, I was blue with cold, chilled to the bone and shivering every night, and I froze stiff in my sleep. The old blanket couldn’t keep out the draft, and I woke up in the morning from having a stuffed nose, due to the sharp, hoarfrosty air that penetrated my room from outside.

  I wander about the streets trying to figure out how to keep my head above water until I finish my next article. If only I had a candle. Then I could try to plug away into the night, a couple of hours was all it would take once I got into my stride. And tomorrow I could call on the “Com mander” again.

  Without further ado, I enter the Oplandske Café to look for my young acquaintance from the bank and touch him for ten øre to buy a candle. They let me pass from room to room unchallenged; I passed a dozen tables where chatting customers sat eating and drinking, pressed all the way to the back of the café, into the Red Room, without finding my man. Embarrassed and annoyed, I crawled out into the street again and started walking in the direction of the Palace.

  Why the hell, why the living everlasting hell, wouldn’t my tribulations ever end! Taking long furious strides, my coat collar turned raffishly up in the back and my hands clenched in my trouser pockets, I cursed my unlucky stars every step of the way. Not a truly carefree moment in seven to eight months, not the bare necessities of life for an entire short week before want once again brought me to my knees. And on top of it all, here I had gone around being honest in the midst of my misery, heh-heh, fundamentally honest anyway! Good heavens, what a fool I had been. And I began to tell myself how I had even gone around with a bad conscience because I had once taken Hans Pauli’s blanket to the pawnbroker. I laughed scornfully at my tender scruples, spat contemptuously in the gutter and was at a loss for words that were strong enough to deride myself for my folly. It should have been now! Were I to find on the street, this minute, a schoolgirl’s modest savings, a poor widow’s last penny, I would snatch it up and stick it in my pocket, steal it in cold blood and sleep like a log all night afterward. I hadn’t suffered so unspeakably for nothing, my patience was up, I was ready for anything.

  I walked around the Palace three or four times and then decided to go home, took yet another turn into the park, and finally went back down Karl Johan Street.

  It was around eleven. The street was rather dark and people were strolling about everywhere, a jumble of quiet couples and noisy groups. The great moment had arrived, the mating hour when the secret traffic takes place and the jolly adventures begin. Rustling skirts, a few bursts of sensual laughter, heaving breasts, excited, panting breaths; far down, by the Grand Hotel, a voice calling, “Emma!” The entire street was a swamp, with hot vapors rising from it.

  I instinctively search my pockets for two kroner. The passion quivering in every movement of the passersby, the dim light of the street lamps, the tranquil, pregnant night—it was all beginning to affect me: this air filled with whispers, embraces, trembling confessions, half-spoken words, little squeals. Some cats are making love amid loud shrieks in Blomquist’s entranceway. And I didn’t have two kroner. It was a torment, a misery like no other, to be so impoverished. What humiliation, what disgrace! And again I came to think of the poor widow’s last mite which I would have stolen, the schoolboy’s visored cap or hanky, the beggar’s haversack which I would have taken to the rag dealer without any fuss and wasted on drink. To take comfort and make it up to myself, I began to see all sorts of faults in these happy people who were gliding by; I shrugged my shoulders angrily and looked disdainfully at them as they passed by, couple after couple. These easily satisfied, candy-chewing students who thought they were cutting loose in Continental style if they could feel a seamstress’ bosom! These young gentry, bank clerks
, merchants, boulevard dandies who didn’t even turn up their noses at sailors’ wives, fat duckies from the cattle market who would flop down in the nearest doorway for a crock of beer! What sirens! The place beside them still warm from last night’s fireman or groom, the throne always equally vacant, equally wide-open—please, step right up! . . . I gave a long spit over the sidewalk, without bothering whether it might hit someone, angry with and full of contempt for these people who were rubbing up against one another and pairing off before my very eyes. I lifted my head and felt deep down how blessed I was to be able to follow the straight and narrow.

  At Storting Place I met a girl who looked hard at me as I came alongside.

  “Good evening,” I said.

  “Good evening.” She stopped.

  “Hmm.” She was out for a stroll so late? Wasn’t it a bit risky for a young lady to walk on Karl Johan Street at this time of night? No? But wasn’t she ever accosted or molested—“I mean, to put it bluntly, asked to come home with someone?”

  She looked at me in surprise, examining my face to see what I could mean by this. Then she suddenly slipped her hand under my arm and said, “Come along.”

  I went with her. When we were a few steps past the cabstand, I stopped, freed my arm and said, “Listen, my friend, I don’t have a penny.” And I prepared to go.

  At first she refused to believe me, but when she had gone through all my pockets without anything turning up, she got peeved, tossed her head and called me a dry stick.

  “Good night,” I said.

  “Wait a minute,” she called. “Those are gold-rimmed glasses, aren’t they?”

  “No.”

  “Then go to blazes!”

  And I went.

  Shortly afterward she came running after me and called me once more. “You can come anyway,” she said.

  I felt humiliated by this offer from a poor streetwalker and said no. Besides, it was getting late and I had to be somewhere; nor could she afford such sacrifices.

  “No, now I want you to come.”

  “But I won’t go with you under those circumstances.”

  “You’re on your way to someone else, of course,” she said.

  “No,” I answered.

  Alas, I had no real bounce in me these days; women had become almost like men to me. Want had dried me up.1 But I felt I was cutting a sorry figure vis-à-vis this strange tart and decided to save face.

  “What’s your name?” I asked. “Marie? Well, listen Ma rie.” And I started explaining my behavior. The girl became more and more astonished. So she had thought that I, too, was one of those types who walked the streets at night chasing little girls? Did she really think that badly of me? Had I by any chance said anything rude to her up to now? Did men behave the way I did if they had something wicked in hand? In short, I had accosted her and walked those few steps with her to see how far she would go. My name, by the way, was such and such, Pastor this or that. “Good night! Go, and sin no more!”

  With that I left.

  I rubbed my hands in delight at my clever idea and talked aloud to myself. What a joy it was to go around doing good deeds! I might have given this fallen creature a nudge toward redemption for the rest of her life!2 She would appreciate it when she managed to collect herself; what’s more, she would remember me in her dying hour, her heart full of gratitude. Ah, how rewarding it was to be honest and upright! My spirits were absolutely radiant, I felt as fit as could be and game for anything. If only I had a candle, then perhaps I could finish my article. I was dangling my new key in my hand as I walked along, humming, whistling, and pondering a way to procure a candle. I had no choice but to take my writing materials downstairs, out on the street, under the lamp. I opened the gate and went up to get my papers.

  When I came back down I locked the gate from the outside and stationed myself under the light from the lamp. It was quiet all around; I could hear only the heavy, clanking footfalls of a policeman in the side street and, far away, in the direction of St. Hanshaugen, a dog barking. There was nothing to disturb me, I pulled my coat collar up around my ears and started thinking with all my might. It would be a wonderful help to me if I were lucky enough to come up with the conclusion to this little monograph. I was at a rather difficult point right now, to be followed by a quite imperceptible transition to something new, and then a muted, gliding finale, a long-drawn-out rumble which would finally end in a climax as bold, as shocking, as a shot or the sound of a cracking rock. Period.

  But the words wouldn’t come. I read through the entire piece from the beginning, read each sentence aloud, but I just couldn’t collect my thoughts for this crashing climax. On top of everything, as I stood there trying to work it out, the policeman came up and planted himself in the middle of the street a little way off, spoiling my entire mood. What business was it of his if at this moment I was working on an excellent climax to an article for the “Commander”! Good God, how absolutely impossible it was for me to keep my head above water, no matter how hard I tried! I stood there for about an hour. The policeman went away. It was getting too cold to be standing still. Crestfallen and discouraged by another wasted effort, I finally opened the gate and went up to my room.

  It was very cold up there, and I could barely see my window in the thick darkness. I groped my way over to the bed, pulled off my shoes and set about warming my feet between my hands. Then I lay down—just as I was, fully clothed, as I had been doing now for a long time.

  The following morning I sat up in bed as soon as it was light and set to work on my article once more. I sat there like that until noon, by which time I had managed to write ten or twenty lines. And I still hadn’t reached the finale.

  I got up, put on my shoes and started pacing the floor to warm up. The windowpanes were coated with ice; I looked out—it was snowing, and down in the back yard the pavement and the pump were covered by a thick blanket of snow.

  I puttered about in my room, took listless turns back and forth, scratched the walls with my fingernails, leaned my forehead carefully against the door, tapped the floor with my forefinger and listened attentively—all without an object, but done quietly and thoughtfully as though I were engaged on a matter of some importance. And all the while I said aloud, time after time, so I could hear it myself, “But good Lord, this is mad!” Still, I carried on as insanely as ever. After a long time, perhaps a couple of hours, I pulled myself sharply together, bit my lips and braced up as best I could. This had to end! I found a sliver to chew on and promptly set about writing again.

  A few brief sentences got done with great effort, a dozen or two miserable words that I forced out at all costs simply to make some progress. Then I stopped—my head was empty and I didn’t have the strength to go on. When I just couldn’t get any further, I began staring with wide-open eyes at those last words, that unfinished sheet of paper, peering at the strange, trembling letters which stared up at me from the paper like small unkempt figures, and at the end I understood nothing at all and didn’t have a thought in my head.

  Time passed. I could hear the traffic in the street, the noise from carriages and horses. Jens Olai’s voice floated up to me from the stable when he talked to the horses. I was completely listless, moistening my lips a little every once in a while but otherwise doing nothing. My chest was in a sorry state.

  It began to get dark. I drooped more and more, grew tired and lay back on the bed. To warm my hands a bit, I passed my fingers through my hair, back and forth and crisscross; small tufts of hair trailed along, loosened wisps that stuck to my fingers and spread over the pillow. I didn’t stop to think about it right then, it didn’t seem to concern me, and besides I had plenty of hair left. I tried once more to shake off this strange drowsiness, sliding like a fog through all my limbs; I sat up, beat my knees with the palms of my hands and coughed as hard as my chest would allow, only to fall back again. Nothing helped; I was fading helplessly away with open eyes, staring straight at the ceiling. Finally I stuck my forefinger i
n my mouth and took to sucking on it. Something began stirring in my brain, some thought in there scrabbling to get out, a stark-staring mad idea: what if I gave a bite? And without a moment’s hesitation I squeezed my eyes shut and clenched my teeth together.

  I jumped up. I was finally awake. A little blood trickled from my finger, and I licked it off as it came. It didn’t hurt, the wound was nothing really, but I was at once brought back to my senses. I shook my head, went over to the window and found a rag for the wound. While I was fiddling with this, my eyes filled with water—I wept softly to myself. The skinny lacerated finger looked so sad. God in heaven, to what extremity I had come!

  The darkness grew more impenetrable. If only I had a candle, then I could possibly write the finale in the course of the evening. My head was clear once more. Thoughts came and went as usual and I didn’t suffer particularly; I didn’t even feel my hunger as badly as a few hours ago, I could surely hold out till the following day. Maybe I could get a candle on credit if I went to the grocery store and explained my situation. I knew the place so well; in the good old days, when I could still afford it, I had bought many a loaf of bread in that store. There wasn’t the slightest doubt that they would let me have a candle on the strength of my good name. For the first time in a long while I brushed my clothes a bit and removed the loose hairs on my coat collar, as far as the darkness allowed. Then I groped my way down the stairs.

  When I got out on the street, it occurred to me that perhaps I ought to ask for a loaf of bread instead. I grew doubtful and stopped to think. No way! I finally answered myself. I was unfortunately not in a condition to tolerate food right now; it would be the same story all over again, with visions and intimations and crazy ideas, and my article would never get finished. I had to show up at the “Com mander’s” before he forgot me again. No way! I decided on a candle. And so I entered the store.