The Hunger Artist: The Separation Of Art From Society

Young Ju is held back by her fears, her consideration for image, and her desire to have a complete family unit; she does choose to take action at the end when she becomes more aware of her situation. On the other hand, The Hunger Artist is not able to navigate his predicament because he is not self-aware.. Through analysis of all three characters, it is apparent that successfully navigating environmental changes requires self-awareness, the power to take action, and taking action

“Hunger” is an article published in 1989 by social justice activist Maggie Helwig. In this article Helwig discusses the stereotypes behind eating disorders, and gives real life examples of the impacts an eating disorder can have on someone. She is able to incorporate many ideas that smoothly flow together to capture the audience’s attention, while also making the audience consider their thoughts and views on eating disorders. She ends the article by giving insightful information as to what it was like for her to suffer from an eating disorder, and why she chose to starve herself for eight years. Helwig uniquely incorporates logos, pathos, and ethos in her writing to completely gain the audience’s attention and influence their opinions on eating disorders.

Franz Kafka’s trademark is ridiculing his and the society’s blatant stories in subtle manner. With the help of paradigms what can be seen is that Franz Kafka’s use of humour in oddly places to clarify the asymmetry of the organized world and heightens the tension. It was also used to create even greater gaps both in scene and story line, to further stress the blackness felt in many of his stories. Studying his works it’s evident that Franz Kafka saw humor not only as a defence against the pain and anguish he felt inflicted upon him by the outside world, but also against the pain he rained upon himself. This technique was used to stress on the horrors of the big bad world. Although there have been resemblances of the protagonists’ character traits to his own self, he has brought out not only his own problems but on how people magnify and in

“The food began to bother me, my stomach felt upset, and I would not be able to hold the food down very long.”(135) This suggests that, the narrator’s own physical body is refusing to settle with the food possibly serves as a metaphor that like the narrator, the food too doesn’t allow itself to adjust to the environment, and revolve around certain forces controlling their actions. The influence of society made the protagonist endure severe deprivation of food, the fact that living under a society that expects the protagonist to have a job and earn money forces the protagonist to live under a “cycle of life.” This being, the author represents the protagonist as with the irony of life, where the protagonists needs to work to eat, but has no food therefore works harder to eat more but continues until his sense of thoughts and his rational skills have been altered “but my brain sank deeper in chaos” (79).

Hunger is a feeling all humans have, and it is one of the feelings and emotions that makes us human. In the book Dawn by Elie Wiesel, the main character Elisha is part of a Zionist terrorist organization. He is given the task from the leader of their organization to execute a captured British soldier, John Dawson. Elisha doesn't want to give him food before the group executes him, because subconsciously it will humanize the captured soldier. When a fellow soldier said they should give him food before they kill him, but Elisha responded, "He listens to his stomach and it tells him he is going to die and he isn't hungry." (Dawn, Wiesel.) This shows the colder side of Elisha and how he doesn't want to humanize Dawson so he is easier to kill. Elisha has experienced hunger himself when he was in the nazi concentration camps.

The audiences fascination with the Hunger artist's fasting is what the artist lived for. In the beginning of the story the hunger artist's desire for attention is illustrated when the narrator said " much more to his taste were the watchers who sat close up to the bars … He was quite happy at the prospect of spending a sleepless night with such watchers."(299) Even the guards who were appointed to watch over him were enough to quench the artist's thirst for attention. When the Hunger Artist was no longer a source of entertainment a circus hired him as a minor attraction. There the story says,

The literal cage depicted as the starving artist home metaphorically establishes the protagonist’s isolation from his entourage. Indeed, this physical barrier interrupts any real contacts from foreigners, beside the instants where they would touch his arms out of morbid fascination: “…even sticking his arm out through the bars to let people fell how emaciated he was, but then completely sinking back into himself” (Kafka 713). Intense

The Metamorphosis (Die Verwandlung 1912), Franz Kafka’s best known short story, is a master work of incredible psychological, sociological and existential malaise. Although his points are simple and straightforward, this richly layered and textured story is open to many interpreta-tions, making it complex, yet critical to decipher. There is an incredible amount of theories based off of what this story could possibly symbolize or represent, but it is of the autobiographical in-terpretation that is undeniably the most enlightening. This interpretation allows the reader to gen-uinely understand the tale on an intense level that would not be able to be reached, otherwise. In order to gain true insight on the autobiographical approach to The Metamorphosis, a brief examination of his life is required; his thoughts, his beliefs, the acknowledgment of the cruel circumstances of his life, especially his home life, must be made clear that the anguish of his own world is the model for the themes in his stories.

Kafka is known for his highly symbolic and oblique style of writing. It is no surprise that several of his pieces contain the same major themes, just in different settings. The fact that he repeats his styles only makes the message that he is trying to convey much stronger. In both “The Metamorphosis” and “A Hunger Artist”, the main

The hunger artist, which is how the nameless main character is referred to as throughout the story, traveled around Europe with his impresario. As the artist traveled through Europe, he would stay in each city for only forty days to avoid losing the interest of the fans. In each town, the hunger artist would choose a public landmark where locals could easily watch him display his “talent” of starvation. Kafka illustrated the artist as a frail, but strong minded man with pride living in a cage with a selfish purpose. The artist did not mind paying the price of comfort and dignity for the possibility of being acknowledged as someone legendary. With a strong passion for displaying this art of fasting, it was illustrated in “The Hunger Artist” that there was a deeper rooted reason for this choice of talent that the artist chose. As stated in “The Biography of Franz Kafka, HCCS.edu/ Library/ EBSCO” ,the author Franz Kafka, had a strange relationship with his parents, because they did not understand his passion in wanting to become a writer and lacked appreciation for Kafka’s work of art. Kafka took “The Hunger Artist” and emerged the factual past of his neglected acceptance from his family with the fictional character to retail his own personal story.

Kafka also uses the existential idea that man's fate is sometimes beyond man's control. In his stories, chance or destiny rules man's life. Gregor could not control his metamorphosis, just as he cannot control his "new" legs which "waved helplessly before his eyes" (1). The hunger artist's fate is to die of starvation, since as he says, "I have to fast, I can't help it" (8). Gregor dies; the artist dies. Their lack of control over their fates emphasizes man's helplessness and "forlornness," to use Sartre's term.

A great artist once wrote, “If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced”. This artist was Vincent van Gogh, soon to be an appraised artist known all around the world for his works, such as Starry Night. He is one of the very first artists of the post-impressionist style than is now adored in every continent. However, there is much more to the man than one painting. Creating a full timeline that stretches beyond Gogh’s life, this paper will discuss the life of Vincent van Gogh and the impression he made on the world.

In Franz Kafka’s short story, “A Hunger Artist”, Kafka introduces an eccentric man known as the Hunger Artist. The Hunger Artist has committed his entire life to the art of fasting, allowing himself to be caged and displayed to the public as if he were a painting (Kafka 198). Despite all the emotional turmoil he endures, he takes a great amount of pride in fasting and believes that he can fast for extremely elongated periods (Kafka 200). Unfortunately, his pride not only causes internal conflicts but also tragically leads to his unfortunate demise (Kafka 205). Through the setting and the character development of the Hunger Artist, Kafka illuminates the dangers of self-pride and depicts pride as harmful and detrimental to one’s existence.

It seems ironic, however, that when his fans were near him, he would show no effort to interact with the crowd. No stories, jokes, or anything of the like with which shared with the watchmen. Instead, he seemed to take the fans for granted, almost treating the fans as if they were weak and unimportant, ? occasionally even stretching his arm through the bars to let them feel how skinny he was, but then again withdrawing completely to himself, paying attention to no one.? (Kafka, 256) The Hunger Artist assumes that the crowd will always be there, witnessing and admiring his skills, constantly wondering, ?How does he do it?? So, as time goes on, the hunger artist becomes more and more expecting of his crowd, hungering more and more for the fame and love that his fans seemed to give. Unfortunately, every star, no

Vincent Van Gogh is one of the most famous artists of all time. He is known for his paintings and is hailed as the quintessential expressionist painter in history. Yet, Van Gogh lived one of the most troubling lives one could ever imagine. Almost every painting can be viewed as a look into his troubled soul. Van Gogh’s Paintings today can be sold for millions of dollars, but during his life time he sold a single painting for a measly 40 francs. Van Gogh’s legacy has left behind stories of greatness and sadness having to do with both his personal life and his career as an artist.