Hunger

Perfect! Yippeee

Knut Hamsun: Genius or Mad Man?

Knut Hamsun’s backgound as an impoverished boy who suffers at the hands both physically and mentally of his darkly religious Uncle seems to shape his novel’s character psyche. Hamsen, himself becomes an existentialist and despises his religious upbringing and questions the existence of God. And yet, he somehow portrays his protagonist in Hunger as a almost pitiful pious character who wishes to become closer to God by suffering. As Christ suffered he may feel he too can purge his sins and receive salvation by his self inflicted torture. He sins for no apparent reason so he can subconsciously design his own punishment. He actually seems to relish his own suffering like a self-inflicted masochist. His characters seem to have psychotic tendencies and schiitzphenic which all show the workings of a troubled past much like Hamsen himself. Hamsun affiliation with Nazi Germany and his hatred of England seem unclear but there is no evidence of anti Semitism, but it can be debated why his character on boarding the ship is enroute to England, a country that Hamsun clearly despises? Hamsun was considered a genius in his writings and was unique in that it was the character who himself would write his own plot as he goes along, “Yet, as if they were escaped convicts these heroes erase their tracks as they proceed, and this seems to be hapless rather than willed; they carry no continuous memory of what they have said or done from scene to scene. They seem only to be escaping themselves. “ Hamsun may have tried to escape from his own life through his character, and uses his novels as a form of  purposeful “Christian Perversion “His character walks around starving in a trance, talking to himself and inventing situations and lying to strangers and punishing himself for sins he has not committed. Hunger is a powerful, deeply disturbing and dark novel that explores the complex crevices of the human mind. There is a fine line between fantasy and realty and Hamsun’s character seems to be lost in the chasm in between these two states.

Deterioration of language

As a writer I would put my soul into my writing. I would ponder the streets pencil in hand until I gained inspiration. Writing is a creative form of expression where each line allows a story to unfold. Distractions were plenty,and a quiet place to gather my thoughts was a luxury I rarely got to enjoy, but even with a gnawing emptiness in my belly I still managed to find solace in my words.

Today, things seem to have changed and I often want to curse at how our language is abused. But I manage to grimace and bear the insult and later feel I am a terrible person for being so critical. And yet I so want to tell the youth of today to respect their mother Tongue. With the advent of text messages and twitter there seems to be both an economy and distortion of words. I fail to understand while perfectly respectable words such as that and this are transformed  to da and dis. Surely, one should grow out of baby talk once an individual has reached a certain age pertaining to maturity. I am sure though my writing would not fetch many if any at all kroner in today's Market, and yet how i would honor the opportunity of promoting the wonders of our language to ever will have the patience to listen to me. After, all with busy lifestyles who has time to read. And yet maybe it is my delirium that speaks for me. I appear to be coherent but one can never be too sure.

Food for thought...

The article about a man who puts himself up on display for hunger voluntarily is in direct contrast to the novel Hunger, where the  protagonist  suffers from hunger in an involuntary manner. The former sees his act as brave and an amazing feat of his strength and prowess and shows it off to an amazed audience who wonder at him in awe after they are satisfied that his feat is legitimate. On the other hand the latter, hides his starvation as a shameful act that his circumstances has made him fall from grace in society. The hunger artist who fasts for 40 days at a time has an achievement to be proud of, and feels depressed if this is taken away from him. What is fascinating for the people who flock to see him in droves. Why do they marvel at his emaciated face and body and wonder how long he will survive. I guess human nature means that we enjoy the macabre. That is why everyone slows down to look at a car crash. It was interesting when the hunger artist whose fan following began to dwindle was forced to be the side act in the circus where the main attraction were the animals. It was also ironic that once he died unnoticed his cage was given to a Panther who ate his food with gusto. As he died he whispered he starved himself as he never found anything he enjoyed eating. Perhaps exhibitionists are in fact desperately lonely people who crave attention to compensate something missing in their miserable lives. Since they do not enjoy life they lose their appetite and the bitterness in their lives infiltrates their food leaving a bitter after taste both literally and figuratively. However it is also common knowledge that depression leads many individuals to the reverse syndrome where they reach for food food comfort, companionship and validation of their existence. Does the pain the hunger artist feels obliterate and numb all his other senses so his emotional pain subsides? Certainly with the novel protagonist he went through various phases of depression, delirium and madness when eventually his body no longer craved for nourishment.He begins to go into his fantasy land as a natural survival instinct that allows the body to hold on to dear life for longer than we often think we are capable of, in a feAt of mind over matter.

I need to also point out the disease of anorexia nervosa where mostly young women starve themselves to be thin. Again our relationship with food whether it be positive or negative has a direct correlation with our psychological state of mind. Food is a pleasure most people thrive on and many live to eat as opposed to eat to live.

Hunger is something we all experience on a day to day basis but for well to do people this hunger is mostly based on not having the time to eat such as skipping lunch to catch up on work. Though psychologically that person knows that food is within their reach and will soon be available. Though medically the body is not so well aware and begins starvation mode and eventually will break down it's reserves. Often depriving oneself is beneficial as it helps to cleanse the body in a detoxification process. Further fasting is important in many religions as it reminds the person what it feels to have an empty belly, and in doing so reminds us of those less fortunate who may be sleeping hungry. So surely hunger should not be a feat to be marveled at and neither should it be a predicament that we need to be ashamed of. As human beings we should strive to be philanthropic and ensure that no one sleeps hungry and that all deaths from starvation cease to exist. Amen.

Technically, not Perfect

Technology is meant to make our lives easier by allowing necessary but mundane tasks easier, efficient and speedier. It is meant to increase our free time so that we can utilize that free time for more important tasks such as friends, family, hobbies. Instead the reverse is true, technology has overtaken our lives and eats into our day giving us less free time for leisure activities. Our method of socializing has become instant and lightening fast but at what price and at what gratification. We now measure our self worth with the number of facebook friends we have, but how many of these so called friends are real friends? how many of our virtual friends will cry at our funeral? Not many I suspect. We meet strangers on a train and add them to our friends list without a second thought, not realising tat we may never meet that person again. We receive friend requests from friends of friends or strangers and feel a false sense of popularity. The virtual world can it really replace a Sunday afternoon tea with a friend to catch up and share in privacy without sharing our thoughts and pictures with all and sundry. Does it make us important or feel like a celebrity that we can post our video of washing the car on YouTube and wait anxiously to see how many hits it received. Yes, technology has taken over our lives and sucked the blood out of our souls and yet we need to keep up with the Jones or feel alienated and ridiculed by modern society. So we remained glued with Google and ponder how our neighbours house looks like from space or follow pointless tweets or......well I could go on for ever and ever blogging but really I have emails to check.....

On a more serious note from my ramblings we need to consider this epidemic in society with grave thought as rather than  enriching it becomes a disease where we measure our worth by how busy we are. Idle time of resting in the backyard is now equated with an unsuccessful person. This brings in mind the novel, Hunger.  The protagonist always seems to pretend to society around him that he is productively engaged in purposeful activity. He feels ashamed of his lowly circumstance of being poor and not having a job so he puts on a charade of being busy to all he meets. It frustrates me that when applying for a job or meeting an acquaintance why cannot he be honest and garner help and sympathy instead of putting on a show and false bravado. Even when he has nothing to do he seems in a great hurry to walk and pretend to be going someplace. Has society created an environment where we are ashamed of falling from grace in a hierarchy that worships success. The protagonist even goes as far as hiding his blanket in a packet to hide the fact he is homeless and therefore out of work. Though the novel is not set in a time that involves technological advances in communication it still dwells on the theme of being busy. Though the protagonist writes to put food on the table rather than an technological addiction.

Should we blame the advent of technology or humans? Well you cannot blame the gun manufacturer but the person pulling the trigger. Technology can enhance our lives but we must control it and not the other way around. Relax and remember to take a stroll in the park with your iPad and Blackberry safely at home!

A New Philosophy

The author a writer himself gives and defends his complex views to his distractors on his belief system of existentialism is a humanism. He wants to avidly respond several reproaches that have been made against his belief system, but I feel he has still a long way to go to fully convince has audience. He feels his views allows people to dwell in despair. Actually his new wave of thinking is both difficult to understand and often leaves you perplexed on the points he is desperately trying to achieve. His views often have no basis and are highly philosophical in nature. It is like asking the perrenial question of what came first, the chicken or the egg? Intact his views when it comes to how we came to exist, in effect who created us seem arbitory to what follows in our lives after we are born. Further more his questioning the existence of god is blasphemous to any god fearing non athiest. After all religion is based on blind faith and not scientific proof. The question remains whether we believe in god as our creator or not,we are created, and to we enter this world with a genetic coding that determines our nature and fate or do the experiences we go through and the circumstances we are subjected to determine our essence of being? This brings the point of existence versus essence. Also as human beings are we really given true freedom of choice or are we hampered by others and commitments that determine our choices at a localized level. Then really our choices are never ours but sacrificial decisions. If a woman gives up her career after having a baby is it her free will or was the choice made for her. On a broader level does our choices set an example for man kind and humanity at large? Do we always have to make the moral decision. This was given in the example in the writing of a young man who had to make the decision to stay with his mother or go to war and revenge his brothers death? Surely there is no real right or wrong or moral choice here it is purely subjective. However, on making a decision is this decision purely of his own free will or is he hampered by the commitments of loyalty and guilt? But if we for a second believe there is no god then why do we need to take the selfless moral path? Surely we all need to hold on to some anchor of belief and restraint that can show us the path of righteousness. The author argues that some people view existentialism is a gloomy view of the world and this promotes pessimism. However the author argues that the reverse is true and that his views are in fact optimism. He explains that "we mean that man first of all exists encounters himself surges up in the world and defines himself afterwards. If man as the existentialist sees him is not definable it is because to begin with he is nothing. He will not be anything until later and then he will be what he makes of himself. Thus there is no human nature...man simply is "I agree that we become the person we are through our upbringing and experiences but I also strongly believe in god and science that does create an unbuilt human nature, such as a person may have a bad temper and another may not. After all even Darwin has stated that we all have inherent traits but we adapt and change due to our environment. The author has given a over simplistic one dimensional view of the world and I would prefer to take a broader perspective than listen to his preaching.